Between Two Worlds
by amyblair
Summary: Story takes place in early Season 3, shortly after Dean’s deal has been made. Sam and Dean are on a hunt for a pair of werewolves but when one brother gets hurt their forced to heal and hunt in unexpected surroundings.
1. Chapter 1

**Between Two Worlds**

**Summary:** Story takes place in early Season 3, shortly after Dean's deal has been made. Sam and Dean are on a hunt for a pair of werewolves but when one brother gets hurt their forced to heal and hunt in unexpected surroundings.

**Disclaimer:** I own nothing of Supernatural. Well, except DVD's and a couple of books. Rights go to the Krip and the gang at the CW. As of the fic, I own the mistakes.

**A/N:** Story should be about six chapters long. I am just about done writing it and that is my best guesstimate. Thanks for all that read and for those who review, always nice to hear from folks. So enjoying this season of SN, the writers are not disappointing. I'm going to the SN Convention in Chicago with a friend of mine, Gaelicspirit, in November. Didn't know if anyone else was attending?? If so, let us know!

**Chapter One: Ankle Deep**

His eyes opened quickly, immediately constricting to the setting sun above him. Things registered with him at a rapid rate, one reality chasing the other: he was on his back, his breathing was sporadic, he could barely move and he was in pain. He blinked a few times, feeling the rise and fall of his chest. His breath came and went. One second it seemed he could inhale normally, the next he was gasping. Painful striders racked through his body and then released into struggling pants. It was a desperate force that set him into a panic, making it difficult to calm himself in the wake of the quiet aftermath.

The light surrounding him teased his eyelids, causing him to wince at the sharp pelts of rays smashing through to the back of his skull. He shut his hazels and let the rainbows of colors swarm in his head. He attempted to roll to his side trying to pull away, go inward, go anywhere but here.

His chest pulled at the tug of his body sending jolts down his spine. His arms instantly came up, hugging his middle. His wet, sticky middle.

He raised his head as much as he was allowed and took a hard glance towards his center. Dark scarlet oozed towards his field of vision, spreading up his flimsy t-shirt. He could see a small pool of red collecting in the curve of his stomach.

_Huh._

His head dropped back behind him, slamming into the hard ground. His eyes shifted. There was short, stubbly grass on either side of him; patches of lumpy dirt peeked through deadened areas. Off to the direction of his boots was a wall of Evergreens. Tall and majestic… and they seemed to be singing. He listened carefully to the music, trying to clear his head. Definitely not singing; they were beating a drum.

His ears perked, listening as the beat became louder. Faster. Stronger. Trees certainly didn't play instruments, though. That much he could muddle through. Which meant chances were the noise wasn't coming from the Evergreens.

_Oh, shit. The wolf. _

It was coming back to finish the job. His arms flailed from his body and reached across on either side of him. Where was his knife? He'd had it in his hand. He grasped at strands of dry and wet grass, the evening mist just starting to touch the Earth. Where was his shotgun? His hands plummeted down, searching. It wasn't shoved in his waistband. His fingers scraped into dirt and mud. Where was his brother? He had been with him, but then had turned and ran the other way. His right hand returned a four-inch stick.

_Shit._

The beat was closing in on him, thumping towards him steadily. He could hear the grass rustling to his left side as the predator made his way near.

He started patting his body down. Hands sliding between his skin and wet abdomen, fingers jamming into pockets. He had to have something. Dirty, bloody fingers revealed to him his flask. He loosened the cap and gripped the smoothness in his left hand, his right clutching the stick.

_Stab and pour?_ It wasn't turning out to be his lucky day.

The pounding increased to his left, changing into crunching thumps racing his way. His breath hitched again, causing the pain to shoot through his chest.

_God, not now._

The trees around him started to swirl and circle his head. Stunning greens and luscious browns blended together in a watercolor painting gone bad. His mind involuntarily wandered to Seurat the Dot and his high school Art History class. He shook his head, but the splotched polka-dots still remained.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

He batted his eyes hard, feeling the sweat trickle off his brow. He hadn't noticed that before as one stream ran into his eyes, stinging and burning with its entry.

More blinking, matching pound for pound of the thumps closing in. The figure came into his view, distorted and smeared with the colors of the outside. Its eyes snagged on its prey and its body plummeted towards him. The world spun, taking gravity with it, as the trees seemed to fall forward. His eyes closed as the wolf approached. He willed himself to stay in the present and not fall inside himself. If he could gain his strength, suck it up, shore up one more time, he could beat this thing and find his brother.

He heard a small whoosh next to him as the grass departed and a small cloud of dirt sprayed against his cheek. He felt the sinking sensation of a solid form near him, right next to his neck. He turned his body abruptly in the direction of the figure and brought his right arm around, plunging the stick into his perpetrator's flesh. Hard. He flexed his muscles and pushed down, determined to pierce something vital.

A firm hand wrapped around his and pulled back his fingers as the stick was revealed to him. It had reached his target and was now standing on its end, firmly planted in his vermin's jeans. His eyes snapped up to see his brother staring back at him. He had skidded to a stop beside him, falling to his knees just in time to have his disoriented sibling try to stab him in the leg.

Lucky for him, his brother barely had any strength left. Not to mention air.

"Dean."

There was a brief hesitation. A quick smile turned up on his brother's face. "Sammy."

It was good to see one another again. The wolves had separated the boys strategically; they were smarter than the brothers gave them credit for. One had let Sam chase after it, while the other had charged after Dean. The larger wolf turned on Sam, as the man was tiring, finally giving him a good shot at his chest when it had pounced. The smaller wolf had abandoned Dean right before, taking off on its own as it waited to see if it could join in on the eatings from the larger wolf's kill. They were hunting partners, probably been hunting together for some time, the boys had figured out individually.

"Hurts," Sam ground out.

Dean nodded back. "Okay, well... hold on."

Enough words. Time for assessment and motion. His brother's hands grabbed Sam's chin, cupping it gently and then quickly eased down his neck and torso. Deep cuts, criss-cross in design decorated his body from the nape of his neck to his thighs. Blood sputtered out in a couple of areas, seeped through in some and trickled out of most. Definitely stitches. And antibiotics. And painkillers.

"How'd you get away?"

Sam pierced his lips together, filling his lungs as best he could and then releasing his air into the chilly mist around him. He thought about the large wolf, white fur ruffled in excitement, teeth bared, the snarl. Sam had been taken down fighting it off. He had to use his fists and slug the animal a couple of times after it had used its teeth to remove the Glock from Sam's grip. It was ready, hungry and it had the younger brother where it wanted him. And then… something had caught its attention.

Sam shrugged one shoulder. "Dunno. It saw – or heard – something. Maybe the smaller one. It took off."

"You didn't see what it was?"

Sam thought about it again. He had seen something in the setting sun. Dusk had been on the horizon, the light was turning the sky orange and deep purple as it worked its way to the other side of the planet.

Then Sam caught what he thought was a quick, white flash by the Evergreens.

"It looked like a bright light." He looked at his brother. "I don't know. It was pretty far out – way over by the trees."

Dean pushed back from his mini-examination. "Can you stand?"

Sam shook his head, eyes closed. His mind wandered again, flashes of the fight, the struggling wolf over him. His chest pulled sharply. If Dean only knew how much effort it was taking just to keep breathing.

"Have you tried?"

His lashes opened and he stared at his brother incredulous, blood dribbling towards his neck.

"I'm just saying…"

They gulped at the same time. Eyes locked on each other in silent conversation. One brother crouching above the other, able to take off and leave. Go for help. But help was a long ways away. Both feeling the urgency to get out of the open. They had gone from hunters to sitting ducks.

"Find my gun."

Dean turned on his heels and looked around, calmly, moving without drawing attention to themselves. His eyes traveled the ground and he left the injured man for a few seconds, returning with both the shotgun and the silver.

Long fingers took them from him, replacing the knife back into the sheath on his waistband, the gun, resting on his right side. He looked back up. "You're gonna have to leave me."

The answer was quick and absolute. A shake of the head. "Not even an option."

Night was falling fast in the depths of the forest. It would take Sam two unbelievable shots to take both wolves down. And that would be tough if he wasn't playing hurt and suffering from minimal blood loss.

"Sam…"

Sam nodded. Dean couldn't carry him. There was nothing he could use to pull him and he certainly wasn't going to be dragged through the woods. He had to get up and walk. Being left behind was suicide.

He nodded tersely and watched as his brother pushed his body to a standing position. Dean's hands crossed at the forearms and he bent down, offering himself to his younger brother.

Sam reached each hand up and felt Dean's warm fingers clasp around his wrists. He met his eyes again and gave a quick nod.

Dean's voice was soft and almost sweet as he gave the count. "One. Two…Three."

Dean jerked up and back, pulling hard as Sam's feet lost ground on the hard dirt. His little brother slid clumsily across the ground, failing to reach purchase. His lanky form flopped back bringing the older hunter with him, causing Sam to fall back to the ground with a dull thud.

"Son of a…" Dean bit off the last part and settled himself over Sam's body, straddling himself across his knees. His eyes followed up the his body as his brother gasped for air, shallow breaths tumbling after another. He shook his head down and took a hard glance over his right shoulder, reaching into the vast darkness of the Evergreens. It had turned from green to black where he had just came from but he could still see the rumpled brush and broken branches of his hurried journey. He watched for any signs of movement, but it was still, except for the wind. Dean's fingers unconsciously slipped across his gun tucked under his belt and his eyes flashed back to the younger man.

The light surrounding them had almost completed its day. The soft heat was being taken over by the chilly air. It sent with it a breezy, cool wind. Dean watched the shivers wave off of Sam and felt the twitches in the long legs under him.

"Come on," he encouraged again, slapping Sam's knees, raising his own body up and extending his hands back down.

Sam's head lulled, shaking back and forth. His eyes were squeezed tighter than his mouth, his hands holding on to his sides.

"Sam," Dean's voice warned, "we're being tracked."

His brother's body stilled. It had registered with him, but his arms laid limply next to his body, the blood from his chest covering the entire front of the t-shirt now.

Dean swallowed. "Dude, the longer we stay here…" he stopped for a moment and tried to use the urgency to his advantage, "one of them is gonna find us."

Dean let his air out when the green slits met his eyes and Sam's head bobbed up and down. The older man planted his feet firmly on the ground and crossed his arms again, large calloused hands stretched to his brother. Sam reached out and clapped his palms to Dean's. The dark blond hair bounced back in rhythm to the silent count. Dean pulled back again, this time pulling lower into his calves. He let Sam's legs hit his, anchoring him around his brother as he grasped at the long body. Sam turned up slowly and painfully until the hisses and groans he had stuffed in his throat made their way out of his mouth. He slurped back his own spit and half-attempted to control his breathing as he realized he was upright. His legs were shaky and lead up to an equally wobbly body. The nausea started to tickle his stomach and Sam shut his eyes. Any second now the ground was going to rush up and meet him.

But then Dean's hand shifted from his wrist to the back of his neck and he was being pulled closer to his brother. Dean's left leg was pushed in between Sam's and the vertigo was releasing. Three extra inches on him but it was Sam who was shrinking and Dean who was standing taller.

"I gotcha, Sammy."

Sam wanted to melt against his brother. Wanted him to just take it all away and let him not have to work for it anymore.

"Come on."

But Dean wouldn't let him off the hook that easy. Not when lives hung in the balance. Especially theirs. Especially Sam's.

Sam staggered to stand on his own, his length working against him, trying to topple him over. But he followed next to Dean in a snail race to the next set of tree lines. He felt the blood run out of his body, warm and thick only to trickle to a cold stop against his skin. His left side carried with it much greater pain than his right causing him to walk with a hunch over his left, casually bumping into Dean in the process. He wanted to apologize but there wasn't enough air in his lungs to make the words magically appear. There was only enough to keep his feet moving forward. He wasn't even really sure how the rest of him was operating.

"We'll get you back to the cabin."

Sam's head shot up at Dean's words. They had scoped the place out yesterday, made sure it was empty before setting up shop. It was the perfect location to nestle in for the hunt, out of the way and smack in the middle of where the killings had occurred. They had spent a couple of days in the three small Michigan towns, interviewing residents and loved ones. It turned out most victims had been out fishing or walking on the edge of the woods, in a nearby park area. Six people had disappeared and then later discovered by local authorities deep in the woods, scattered near the cabin. Their throats were slashed apart, chests were gorged, skin ripped away. Some didn't have their livers, some were missing their spleens, but all were without hearts. The lunar cycle didn't match up, but the way of killing, the damage inflicted… it pointed to werewolf.

"Almost there, Sam. Stay with me."

Sam shivered. He hadn't realized how much he was using Dean as a crutch. He pulled away, standing taller, one foot sluggishly following the other. He wished they were there already, that he was patched up and covered to his neck in warm blankets. He pushed the butt of the gun down on the dirt and shoved off, motivating his legs ahead. The locals had pointed them in the general direction of Jed Ward's cabin. The old man was something of town legend, dying many years ago in the earlier 1900's, and passing the out-of-the-way house on down the names of ancestors. It had been in the Ward family forever, really, or at least since any of town folk could recall. The only surviving child the old man had, Carla, inherited the house. Jed's son and wife had passed on at a family get-together near the cabin. A vicious attack. Wolf-related. It happened in these parts, even back in the day. Jed and Carla had witnessed the maulings and although people warned him, Jed refused to leave his home.

Carla was married at the time, with a couple of children. Apparently, after she died, one of her children took over ownership and then the grandchildren. Two elderly men sitting outside of the barbershop in the last town rocked in their chairs, chatting about a beautiful young woman who had come into town a long time ago. She claimed she was Ward's great-granddaughter, Caroline. She came in for supplies as she was planning on spending the weekend out at the old family shack.

"How long ago was that?" Sam had inquired.

The old men thought maybe it had been fifteen, twenty years, maybe more if time moved as quickly as they suspected it had the older they got. Their memories just weren't what they use to be. But the portly man, with the tiny glasses, seemed to remember two other things about Jed's kin's last visit. One, she wasn't alone. She had been traveling with her young daughter. And two, it had been at the tail end of the last killing spree.

Sam had bunkered down and started his research on the Internet and at the towns' community centers. All three towns consisted of about one hundred fifty people, just shy of four hundred all together. They just didn't have the means for libraries or record halls.

"Every twenty-five years people come up missing or dead," Sam had reported to Dean. "It's been happening for at least… well, over a hundred years." What was even more odd was the number. It was always the same. Eight people came up missing, eight corpses found out in the middle of the forest. Shredded.

That meant there would be two more victims. Two more people to save.

There wasn't much information about Jed Ward's cabin. Just a deed, stamped as "paid for" in 1884. It had been actually acquired by the family before that date, but the records were nowhere to be found.

Dean nodded and grabbed their things, packing heavily. They had to park the Impala over a mile away from the location of the cabin, trekking through dense brush and forest just to reach the clearing. It was another quarter of a mile to the house sledging through mud and gunk as they forged on. No grass, no flowers, just mud. The house sat calm and quiet in a small valley, surrounded by numerous small dirt mounds.

"Must be a bitch when it rains," Dean mumbled as he slid on some hidden mud under the mounds.

The cabin was filthy - inside and out. The windows were streaked with grit and grime, about twenty-five years worth. The wood was splintered, boards needed replaced and if there had been a color painted on it, it was long faded now. The door sat in the center of the front of the house with a modernized peephole, sandwiched between two small windows. There was a design toward the center of the door, an etching made from hand and the whole package gave the appearance that the door was smiling at the hunters as they approached.

Dean had stashed two duffels in the house, after picking the newer lock. One contained extra clothes for both brothers, bottled water, food and first aid supplies. The other contained extra weapons, herbs, books and rituals. He stuffed one behind an old brown leather sofa and the other in a large closet off the living area.

The inside of the cabin was dank and dreary. Curtains and blinds were pulled down and were covered in dust. There was a small kitchenette with an eating area attached to it. A newer refrigerator was installed next to the kitchen sink. Oyster colored Granite countertops were smooth and glossy under the film of dirt. There was a compact microwave over the small stove. Old mixed with modern. Someone had made updates here in the past twenty years.

The living area was small, but big enough for the old sofa and two matching leather chairs gathered around an old-fashioned coffee table. Two bedrooms flanked the back of the house with a small bathroom wedged in between.

"There aren't any beds in here," Sam had observed, "but it looks like the couch folds out." Each bedroom came equipped with a closet and a chair, both brown leather as well. The rooms were each stacked with classic books, dusty and unused. There was a small phonograph in one room and a larger 1960's clock radio in the other. The living room had a record player with two large speakers on either side. Towers of vinyl records were nestled in the corners. There wasn't any electricity that sparked when Dean flicked the lights, but two generators sat in the backyard, next to an old well pump, and both fired up when Sam tested them. The pump could fuel the flush of the toilet and water lightly drizzled out of the shower, but no way they would try to drink the grayish-concoction.

Sam had armed himself with his favorite Glock, Dean took his Colt and each had a blade on them as they headed out the door. Sam had also grabbed his shoulder bag as well, loaded with salt and lighter fluid. Things hadn't been working smoothly lately They had run across a string of hunts that had fallen apart in their hands, but just in case things started looking up, they couldn't forget the most common part of their job.

Dean had refused anything else. He had a way of doing that lately. Making sure Sam was fully ready, that Sam was protected, that Sam was untouchable. Because now with his signature in red, sealed with a hot kiss, he was already a dead man. So, Sam came first. Of course, he had always came first. It was just more apparent these days.

"Sam?"

The younger hunter shook his head; his world no longer swimming. It was drowning. His knees trembled and he hadn't noticed Dean's grip had tightened under his arms.

"I need to… sit down."

Dean ticked his head to the left. "Just a little further…"

But Sam was already lowering himself to the ground, folding his knees up to his stomach and holding on. The pain was engulfing his chest, burning his lungs. Even the small hairs on his torso were being pulled from the wet, clingy t-shirt. The dim light was a welcoming comfort to him; the ground accepted his weight and a coppery-salt smell hit his nose. Followed intensely by a strong, fruity aroma.

_Blood. Sweat. But the third…_

"You smell that?"

Dean was already turning around when the wolf hit him. It was lean and small and covered in white fur. His hands pushed instinctly against it and then his elbows followed, pushing and prying as the little animal ambushed its prey. White jagged teeth sneered, tainted with red and it snapped at the hunter. Dean's body shifted under its weight as the wolf rolled with him back down the small hill he and Sam had just climbed.

"Dean!" His brother's scream came way too delayed, way too late as Dean's back was rubbing on debris, skidding down the mound. The animal planted its front paws on the older hunter's chest and it lashed out, its maw coming within centimeters of Dean's jugular.

"Sam," Dean began, but it hit the air breathlessly. The animal was small, but it was a powerhouse and it used its position to its advantage, taking guard over Dean's shoulders, pinning him to the hard ground.

Dean brought his hands up and grabbed the animal's jaws, holding them together. He shoved back; the wolf's neck was strained as far as he could push without breaking it. The wiry body struggled to free itself, flopping like a fish out of water, loosening Dean's hold on him. His hands slipped and Dean tried to crab-crawl back as fast as he could.

It wasn't fast enough. The claws were splayed and swiped easily and angrily at the hunter as he moved away. Red flesh returned, embedded in the animal's nails, leaving Dean's left side dripping. He rolled in protection, reaching back to his waistband where his knife was securely waiting for him.

Dean's hand pulled back, steadying his sights on the small wolf's neck when its claws came back again and scratched down Dean's left side for the second time, tearing at new skin, ripping into scratches recently imposed.

Dean moaned and let a small cry release, the knife losing its power of fight, Dean losing his mark. The silver lightly tore into the wolf's left shoulder blade. Barely a drop of blood spilled back.

The wolf swiped at his right hand, the blade flying easily from the older man's grasp, slicing new scratches into his hand and wrist. Dean coiled into a half ball, bringing his knees closer to push the animal off. The wolf stared down at him, grinning with large white fangs, dripping saliva escaped its bottom lips. Its lackluster silver eyes greedily gazing into Dean's orbs. A long pink tongue projected out and licked the width of its mouth. Any second now, Dean watched, it was going to take its bite.

"Hey, doggy," Sam's voice was crisp and close. Dean turned at the same time as the wolf to see Sam lingering over them, Glock pointed at the small chest. The animal released a rumble from its vocal cords and bared its teeth, muscles bouncing under its skin as it considered its next move.

Sam made it for him. The sound of the gunshot echoed in the woods, the Evergreens reverberating it back over and over again to the hunters' ears.

Sam didn't bat an eye. One hit, silver bullet, through the heart and the animal fell instantly. The blood spilled quickly from the tiny hole and Dean was already scrambling out from beneath the heap of fur.

"Nice shot," Dean commented as he kicked away from the wolf. His own hands went to his left side as he surveyed the damage the wolf had inflicted. Surface wounds. They spattered blood trails and left behind serrated skin tears, but nothing deep. Nothing like the gashes and craters adorning Sam's upper body. He smiled and turned his head towards his brother. Or maybe more like his disoriented brother who was falling to his knees, gun still in hand.

"Sammy!"

Dean scooted from his spot near the slain wolf and hurried over to his younger brother. His arms unraveled from his body as Sam swayed in the blowing wind and he reached the younger man right before he took the nosedive. Perfect timing. His ring caught on the back of Sam's jacket as he pulled him upright, tapping his cheeks gently. "Hey, Sam. Sam! Open your eyes."

Dark hazels sluggishly opened to the command, staring heavily at his older brother. Sam shifted his own weight on his knees, feeling the somber pull of gravity, feeling the swarm of nausea. "Cold, Dean."

Dean nodded in response. "Okay. Let's get you back up the hill. Cabin's not far."

Sam met his brother's eyes. He was defeated.

"Come on. I promise. Just a little bit more, okay?"

Sam swallowed hard and gave him a quick nod. "Not far."

"Right. Not far."

The younger brother's eyes narrowed. "You okay?"

Dean huffed. "Seriously? You think Lassie could take me down?"

Sam tried to smile, but abandoned the idea when the sides of his cheek quaked. He gestured towards the wolf. "Burn it first."

Dean glanced behind him. The fur was shedding; speckles of white spots still coated the transforming body. Dean's eyes tapered as he looked at the white skin underneath, pale and silky. Young. Real young.

He turned back to his brother. "I'll come back for it."

Sam shook his head. "No, I can wait." He nodded towards the smaller bag he had with them. "Lighter fluid's in there. And salt."

Dean stole another quick look. The wind had kicked up and most of the white fur was gone now, leaving behind a small corpse.

"What is it?"

Dean swiveled back to his brother, taking in his interest, but keeping him diverted. "Nothing." He met Sam's eyes. "Dude, you're freezing. I'll come back for him."

Sam's eyes ventured over Dean's shoulder. "It was a guy?"

Dean nodded, trying not to seem frantic to grab his brother's view. "Yeah. Come on…"

But Sam's eyes were locked on the petite form lying lifelessly on the hill. He pushed himself up with the palms of his hands, ignoring the blood that spilled out of his gashes, ignoring the pull and pain, ignoring that he didn't have the energy to move, and pushed by Dean.

"Jesus Christ." It was a whisper. This wasn't real. Werewolves were make believe. Everyone knew that. And kids weren't werewolves. This was a dream.

Dean grabbed at his brother's shoulder. It didn't feel like a dream. It felt pretty damn real. Sam wiggled away from Dean's hold.

"Sam, don't. Don't look. Please."

But Sam couldn't help but look at anything else. He crept up slowly to the form and studied it from head to toe. He was perfect. A blonde haired little boy, muscles formed under his milky skin, all ten fingers and all ten toes. His lips were still pink and puckered, his eyes were slightly open and Sam could see the flicker of light brown his iris had once projected into the world. His rib cage was visible through his thin body, his chest torn open from the tiny bullet hole, blood still finding its way out. He was beautiful.

Sam sunk down to his knees, his hands gently grazing the boy's still-warm arm. "What do you think?" his voice, surprisingly strong wafted to Dean.

His brother was struck in silence. He shrugged his shoulders behind Sam, knowing he couldn't see him. "What? You want me to get the bag…"

"You think he's, what? Seven? _Eight?_" Sam hitched on the last word, causing his eyes to burn.

Dean crept up behind him, placing a hand on his younger brother's back. He tapped lightly on him, offering his aide in helping Sam to stand again. "Yeah," he answered, "somewhere right around there."

Tears danced on Sam's brims as he lifted his lids back up, staring, unbelievably at his actions. "I shot a…"

"A werewolf, Sam." Dean challenged his stare. "You shot a werewolf."

One tear amusingly made its way down Sam's cheek. He angrily batted at it, irritated at the betrayal. "No. A boy."

Dean was shaking his head, ready for the guilt, ready for the self-battery of four-letter words. "It was a _thing_. It was trying… it was _going_ to kill me. I wouldn't have done anything different than you did. You know that."

The brown moppy bangs fell forward, causing a dark shadow over Sam's face. His already abused chest seemed to even out, taking breaths deeper. His body seemed to be accepting, but Dean knew his mind would be another story.

Dean placed his hand under Sam's armpit and started to pull him up, grabbing at his sleeve. "Someone else… did that… to the boy. You only shot a monster."

But as Sam was being raised away from his kill, the werewolf didn't look like much of a monster anymore. He looked like somebody's son. Somebody's brother. Somebody who should have been in the second grade.

"Dude, you're soaking. You're bleeding all over." Dean's hands pushed the taller man upright and he wrapped his right arm around his waist. It was going to take longer to get back to the cabin now, injured and disheartened. Dean had more weight to carry from his younger brother.

"Up over this hill, Sam."

Sam's shoulder bumped into Dean's and he automatically tried to straighten himself up, only to find his body being pulled back down by his weight. Pulled back down by the weight of the universe. Or maybe it was Hell. Maybe Dean's deal came with other consequences for both of them to live through first. His shoulders really were heavy and he was losing ground fast.

"You remember leaving the lights on?" Dean's voice waffled over to Sam. The older brother started to slow his pace feeling Sam's body lean towards him. The generators in the back were fully charged and able to supply the small house with power for a few days. Dean's gait stalled to an almost stand still. Sam's arm came up on his shoulder and he met his brother's eyes with need. Need to get into the safety of the other side of the smiling door. Dean winced and gulped and then dragged his brother along with him. Two sets of booted feet started up the old steps of the front porch.

They stopped short of turning the knob as music filtered in from under the doorjamb.

_Well, she was an American girl_

_Raised on promises_

_She couldn't help thinkin' that there_

_Was a little more to life _

_Somewhere else… _

"Sam, I didn't turn on the radio," Dean hoarsely whispered to his pale brother.

Sam barely heard him, however, his head was spinning. The Earth was wildly teetering and tottering hard lefts and sharp rights. He could feel warm sticky goo run down his leg as Dean stood still, trying to decide the best course of action.

"Knock," Sam requested.

"What?"

Sam's energy was leaving him. "Please."

Dean blinked. There really wasn't any other choice. They had left two of their duffels stashed away in the house yesterday before they headed out for the hunt. With any luck, the new occupants hadn't discovered them yet.

"Sure," Dean smirked, "I mean, Tom Petty fan, right?"

Sam managed a smile and a slight roll of his eyes.

Dean rapped on the door.

Tom Petty's voice lowered, the volume softly playing in the background accompanying the noisy squeaks of the floorboards.

_Oh, yeah, all right_

_Take it easy baby_

_Make it last all night_

_She was an American girl._

Shadows cast eerily through the small windows of the door, the feet smacking on hardwood becoming closer and then all movement ceased. Dean flashed a smile, figuring he was the center of attention through the peephole. His lips felt foreign as they tightened over his teeth. The smile didn't touch his eyes, though. The greens were too busy shifting to his brother who was slumping heavier on his shoulder.

The knob softly clicked and turned as the old oak door crept open. The inside started dark and grew lighter as the crack became larger and then they were greeted by something very familiar. The double barrel of Dean's shotgun.

**Playlist:** _American Girl_ from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** See Chapter One

**A/N:** Forgot. I will post chapters every two to three days until it's completed. I personally don't like waiting for people to update chapters because I'm an instant gratification girl so I try hard to not let others wait. Thanks for all the reviews and for those who are still reading.

**Chapter Two: Cabin Down Below**

The door inched open and Dean heard the cock of his gun as it pointed firmly at his temple. No way anyone could miss the shot. His throat worked up and down, trying to think of something clever to say so the occupant would let them in. Without killing them. Or calling the cops. Or both.

The door opened a quarter of the way before it stopped. A blonde head turned from side to side, looking at each brother, sizing them up. Three seconds had passed by and first impressions would have already been made. Dean hoped his good-looks and physical charm would be on their side as the gun swayed from himself to Sam. His brother was of no help in Dean's silent hope of getting in the door.

Eyes dimmed over the scope in a scowl. The night air suddenly felt warmer on the hunter's face.

"Squatters."

Not the greatest impression they had ever made. Dean let out a breath. "Yeah, I can explain that…"

Eyes shifted to the body leaning onto the older brother's shoulder. The door opened more and Dean could see the blonde hair cascade down into locks of curls, resting on small shoulders. The woman eased up on the rifle, backing away from the doorway. She raised her blue eyes on Dean and shrugged. "Wolf?"

Dean's stare softened as she spoke, the hunter felt a momentary euphoria roll over him. She could help. Sam suddenly felt so heavy against him now. Dean simply nodded and the woman shoved the door open with her bare foot.

Dean scrambled Sam inside to the center of the room. He remembered the layout of the cabin easily, the sofa was off to the right and he headed for it.

"Wait," came the call over his shoulder. Dean reluctantly heeded as he felt a small gust of wind blow by him. The woman spun around, bedspread full in her arms as she laid it out on the sofa. She nodded back. "Okay."

Sam sunk onto the couch the same time Dean lost his hold. His long body turned over, staring up to the lights bouncing off the ceiling. This was a definite improvement over having his feet half-dragged through the muddy outdoors. Sam tried to catch his breath, gather his surroundings, find words to tell where it hurt. But things just weren't connecting right. His breath was shallow and his head felt numb, his thoughts were jumbled. Puzzle pieces of his life were hard to stick into place. His internal clock started a slow throb in his ears.

One spin. The room swirled to the right. He caught sight of his brother moving. His hands were reaching out for him, his lips mumbling words he couldn't hear. Sam really wanted to tell him something. Something important.

Two spins. The colors around the room blended together, meshing over his head, tattooing distant images to the back of his lids. An old candlestick, a black coffee cup, a silver cross.

Three spins. And the darkness took over.

Dean raced to the duffel in the closet and returned with a rolled up t-shirt, gently stuffing it under his younger brother's head.

"Here." He reached his hands down to help lift Sam's head and realized then that he was the only one working. He released Sam's neck and checked his brother's pulse. Strong and steady. He backed up, glancing at the pale skin acting as a canvas to the purple blotches under Sam's eyes. He had to do something about the blood loss before it got them both into trouble.

Silver scissors were being dangled in front of Dean's periphery and he gawked back for a second, his eyes focusing.

"Cut his shirt off," the woman ordered, kneeling down next to the stranger in her cabin. She reached out and started untying Sam's shoes, her fingers moving swiftly and gracefully over the laces.

Dean gripped the sheers and cut up the middle of the shirt, pulling back the saturated cotton in one soggy layer.

"Aw, God," Dean sighed. He blinked quickly, staring down to the open gashes covering Sam's chest. Deep slashes, interweaved and zigzagged, dug deep grooves in various degrees across his brother's flesh.

"Here," the woman handed him a bundle of towels, stacked high. "I'll get some water." She rose from Dean's side and returned with a jug. "I can heat some up, if you need me to."

Dean started pouring the water over the towels and laid them over his brother's chest. The woman returned to Sam's feet, his shoes already removed and started pulling off socks. Her movements were quick and tender. Like she had done this before many times. Like she was a mother.

Dean blotted his brother's torso, wiping it clean of both dried and fresh blood. He grimaced as he sat back on his haunches, his eyes evaluating the areas that would need stitches. There were more cuts than he had originally thought. The wolf had viciously left its mark.

Kneeing his way behind the sofa, Dean reached for the second duffle bag, hauling it back with him and started to pull out the sutures. He threaded the curved needle and removed a towel. Blood filled the cavity immediately. He pressed down hard and glanced at his lovely assistant who was working on loosening Sam's belt.

"Think you could give me a hand?" Dean asked sheepishly. He'd beg, if he had to.

Her hands stilled. They were small and her manicured fingers were long and beautiful and awkwardly fumbling on the velvety metal of the belt buckle.

"What?" Her head turned and she looked at Dean. Really looked at him. His eyes, in return, soaked in her delicate features, the fragility of her cheekbones, the striking pale of her blue eyes, the tremble of her chin. He guessed she was over twenty-five, but not quite yet thirty. Such a great age for a beautiful woman. She was average in height, but very thin, no hips to hug her jeans close, but her yellow t-shirt with, _The Ramone's_ plastered over it in black letters, did her breasts justice.

"Just," Dean began, breaking away from the fear her eyes held, "hold the towel back against his skin." He demonstrated the action. "So the blood doesn't pool."

She swallowed and flashed him a shaky smile. "I don't… do blood very well."

"Queasy, huh?"

Her smile turned up a bit more.

Dean lifted a shoulder. "I'll walk you through it."

"I might pass out," she half-joked as she shifted her weight towards the outsider. Her hands splayed across Sam's chest, slowly reaching for the towel. She pulled back on his flesh, exposing the angry wound underneath. The dark blood trickled into the open tissue and the woman cringed back automatically.

The older brother worked quickly and quietly, stitching the inside wall first, securing muscles back together and then cinching the connective tissue near each other before pressing the skin back in place. He moved the needle in and out through Sam's skin, maneuvering the curved pin like a medical professional.

"Over here," Dean instructed the woman as he removed the saturated towel and grabbed a clean one to start again. He felt a shudder next to him as the terry cloth turned burnt red and spread rapidly. The hands holding the skin back jumped a few times and Dean could feel the cool tension emit from her entire body.

"You okay?" He shifted his eyes once and then back to the stitching.

"I might get sick," she answered honestly.

Dean's head bounced in response, unconsciously keeping beat with the music softly filling the lulls of silence.

_I was talking to a friend of mind, said a woman had hurt his pride._

_Told him that she loved him so and turned around and let him go._

"What's his name?" her voice chirped, suddenly feeling very close to the older man's ear.

Dean kept his hands moving, trying to close up another gash. "Sam."

She exhaled slowly, her breath blowing wistfully on the side of Dean's cheek. "Should be easy to remember. I had a brother named Sam."

Dean startled mid-stitch at her personal revelation. Maybe it was the word "brother" or the word "had" or maybe it was because her breath was now on his neck. He blinked a few times and continued the job at hand.

She seemed to sense the change in the air. "He's your brother?"

A brief nod. And then the nod kept going, the music steadying his hands, directing his head.

_Don't do me like that. Don't do me like that. _

_What if I love you baby? Don't do me like that._

"Is this… your place?" Dean inquired. Another towel was removed and a new one was drenched over Sam's stomach. Dean moved to another deep cut.

"Yes."

"So, you're Jed Ward's granddaughter or great-granddaughter?" She was too young to be the granddaughter, Dean had calculated.

He could feel the stare at his back as the questions were pouring through the woman's mind, but blood started spurting out and she shrank back. "Yeah. Great-granddaughter. I'm Carly." Her voice was mousy now, scared of the scarlet.

"Your mother was Caroline?"

She seemed to hold her breath for a second and then let it go. "How do you…" she dropped the question. "Yes."

Dean's mouth quirked up in a crooked smile. "I'm Dean."

Carly patted the area around Sam's wound with the towel. The bleeding seemed to be slowing enough on the other slashes for Dean to handle the stitches without the need of a nurse's aide. The young woman rose and went to the kitchen to wash her hands. She poured water out from a ten-gallon jug with ease.

Dean glanced over at her, his eyes narrowed. There were stacks of jugs behind her in the kitchen. Jugs of water Carly had apparently brought with her.

_And you know you better watch your step or your gonna get hurt yourself._

_Someone's gonna tell you lies, cut you down to size._

"Tom Petty fan, huh?" Dean mused. He watched her from a distance, hushed and guarded. She was interesting, the way she moved, the coolness she held, the trust she gave to the hunters. It was naturally… all wrong. She should have been screaming bloody murder, running for her life. Instead she was drying her wet hands on a kitchen towel.

"One of my favorites," she answered without looking up. Dean wondered about her other favorites. He bet she had lots of them.

He turned back to Sam, threading the needle for the sixth time and started on another jagged tear. The pinch punctured through the skin as Dean pulled the needle through. There was a flinch and a hiss of pain.

Dean looked up to see hazels staring back under furrowed brows. Sam's hand clutched at the bedspread under him, whiting his knuckles.

Dean tilted his head. "Welcome back, Sammy." His brother's dark hair pressed into the rolled up t-shirt as Dean continued to sew. "Sorry 'bout the pain. You were out for the worst of it, though."

Sam pulled air in through clenched teeth as Dean poked through his flesh again. His entire torso felt like it was lit on fire. He let a curse escape into the air and opened his eyes, blinking several times before he could actually see. And when he did, he locked on stunning pale blue orbs that peered down at him over his brother's shoulder. A sleek silver cross dangled from the owner's neck, catching flickers of light.

"Sam." She spoke his name as though it were familiar, but with a hint of sadness behind it. Not spoken for some time, but with a longing of something Sam wasn't privy to.

He nodded back to her. His forehead was peppered with sweat beads, his body shaking from the pain and blood loss. He could feel the color leaving his cheeks, trying to find a more vital area to attend.

"Dean…"

"Is he going into shock?" She turned her question towards Dean, who had stopped threading and was clasping his hands around his younger brother's wrists. His pulse was regular, but had slowed to around fifty beats per minute.

"Could you grab me a blanket and some pillows?" Dean asked. Carly backed away and ran in the opposite direction, heading for the back bedrooms. Dean reached over the sofa and turned the lamp hanging over them down to the lowest setting and smiled back at Sam. "It's okay," he reassured him, "you can go to sleep if you need to."

Sam's eyes were wild, which wasn't settling the older man's nerves. He looked like he was going to jump out of his skin at any moment. Dean rested his hand on Sam's forehead and thumbed at they worry lines between his eyes. Sleep would be the best thing for him. "I'll be here when you wake up, Sammy."

Carly returned with the blankets and the pillows. "Cover him up," Dean instructed, trying to make it sound more like a request. He scooted down to Sam's feet and propped them up with the pillows. He pulled the dark blue blanket out and wrapped the over-sized feet warmly. Then the tucking of the covers began. Dean wrapped the ends around his baby brother, tight in the middle, keeping his arms and hands enveloped inside, right up to the neck. He worked like a specialist. Like someone's father.

Sam sighed in surrender. His eyes were closed by the time Dean made it back up his body. Dean rubbed a hand over his own eyes, scrubbing it down his face.

"Here," Carly started from behind him, "Sit."

Dean turned on his heels to see the young woman had brought up a chair from the kitchenette. It was a dark mahogany, it's seat smooth and shiny in the dim light. Dean graciously took it and sat down next to his brother where he could wait and monitor.

It also gave him time to breathe and to take a look at where they were. Of course, they were in the cabin. The same one they had staked out the day before and hid their duffel bags in. The same one where the bleakness filled the rooms and the dust was finger-layered thick. Only, now, the same cabin was enchanting. It was clean of all the grit and grime. There were candles burning in the kitchen, pink hand towels hanging over the handle of the stove and the faint scent of lemon in the air. The hardwood was polished, the vinyl records were divided into two columns, the record player was covered in its perfect plastic case, just like new. On top of the speakers was an iPod, charged up and softly playing, teasing the fruity air around them.

_I got a radio,_

_Put it on soft and low_

_Baby, let's go _

_To the cabin down below_

"You cleaned the place up?" Dean lifted his eyebrows to Carly.

The blonde hair swished, the curls perfectly rolling down her neck, tickling her back. Carly stopped by the front door and opened it. Her head popped outside, looking from left to right. She shut it hard and locked it. She reached down and grabbed the knob and pulled hard. It stayed firmly shut. "Yeah, it was filthy," she answered as she repeated her actions again, opening the door, locking it and pulling on the knob.

"That's… a lot of work to do in one day," Dean commented. He watched her go through the unlocking of the door a third time, looking outside, shutting the door again, locking it and pulling on the knob. She didn't respond and Dean threw out a, "Huh?"

Her face turned over her shoulder and she unlocked the door. "Yeah." Her head turned from side to side and she shut the door hard, locking the bolt and pulling the knob. "I'm expecting some friends, though."

"Friends?"

She unlocked the door. "Yeah, a couple of guys. We meet up here every so often. Kind of a tradition." She brought her head in and bolted the door, pulling the knob.

"Carly?"

She stopped and turned around, pressing her back to the oak.

Dean smiled, his cheek ticking in a swift quirk. "The door's locked."

Her hands remained flat, spread behind her on the cold wood. She rubbed the door a few times before Dean realized she was counting to herself. He lowered his chin and waited for her to hit the magic number before she pushed herself away from the locked entry.

_Time's been moving slow_

_Since we both got here_

_Baby, let's go _

_To the cabin down below_

Dean watched as the young woman's slim form edged up beside him. His head turned up as hers looked down and she took in a long breath and held it for a few seconds before speaking. "You're bleeding."

He had completely forgotten.

"Take your boots off and go take a shower. Let the water run for a few seconds. There should be clean towels hanging on the bar." She looked away with an icy glare that sent a chill down his spine. Dean froze for a moment and then she turned towards him again and gave him a perplexed frown. "What're you waiting for?" she joshed him and the warmth seemed to return to the small space.

Dean gulped and toed off his boots, pushing them over to the side of the sofa. He rose and started across the small distance to the back bedrooms.

"Keep it down," she warned as he began to disappear into the darkened area.

He stopped and turned around. "Sam will probably sleep for awhile," he gestured towards his near comatose sibling. Sam looked so young under the soft light.

She sauntered over to the chair Dean had just abandoned and picked up one of his boots. "I know," she agreed with a snickering huff. "But Eliza might not."

Dean stared at her, confused. "Who?"

Carly looked up as her fingers gracefully untied his laces. She placed the boot down on the floor and picked up the other one. "Eliza, my daughter. She's sleeping in the left bedroom. So be respectful and be quiet back there."

Dean's neck pivoted to the door on the left. It was closed now, but Dean knew it was the room with the phonograph. There was a chair and stacks of books, dust caked over them from years of being unused and neglected. Forgotten.

But, there had been no bed.

"She's sleeping in there?" Dean inquired, looking back to the woman who was working out a tough knot in Dean's shoestring. "Did she…" he didn't know how to tactfully bring up the lack of furniture.

Carly shot him a look. Waiting.

"Did she bring a sleeping bag?"

"No," the woman seemed entertained.

"Then, is she sleeping on the floor?"

The knot was loose and Carly lowered the boot down to the floor. She placed it next to its partner and turned them both so the toes were pointing north, to the wall behind the sofa. She repositioned them until they were equal distance apart from one another and the heels met up at the same imaginary, parallel line.

"She's sleeping in her bed."

Dean's eyes slid back to the closed door. He wanted to open it up and take a peek inside, but that wouldn't be… respectful. Maybe she was sleeping on a blow-up mattress or a fold-away cot. Either way, he decided, it could wait until morning.

"How old is she?" he lowered his voice, carrying it over the distance in a harsh whisper.

Carly was straightening the blanket covering Sam. Every wrinkle, every bubble, her hands flattened and smoothed the flannel out, mummifying him. She didn't even bother looking up this time when she answered. "Uh…" she took the scissors from the coffee table that Dean had just used and cut off a stray thread hanging from the end of the blanket. "Five."

Dean nodded back to her. He halted in front of the right bedroom door, stalling to walk through. He turned his back to the living room and looked into the darkness. His hand felt along the inside wall until he found a light switch and flicked it on. The 1960's clock radio was there and the leather chair, pushed into the corner. The books were stacked in here as well, but no dust accompanied them now. The floor was mopped and waxed and a mint green rug warmed the hardwood. Picture frames were displayed on built in shelves and a fresh bouquet of white orchids were displayed on a small table near the chair.

Dean turned around to ask Carly where she was going to be sleeping, but quickly bit his bottom lip. She was back at the door, unlocking it and looking outside, shutting it hard, locking it and pulling the knob. His eyes fell down, catching with it the stains of blood on his own clothing caused by the claws of the young wolf.

_Shit._

The boy – no, the _wolf_. His body – no, _its_ body - was still out there. He had to get cleaned up so he could go out and salt and burn it. Get dirty all over again. But if he went out now with the smell of blood perfuming him, it would only attract the other wolf.

He thought of Carly's friends coming to the cabin, walking through the woods on their way to the cabin. There had been six killings, the werewolf would take two more. Realistically, it would be easier to do, safer to do, with someone watching his back. No, he could do this one alone. Then come back and try to keep his brother from dwelling too much. Try to keep his mind off the small body. Off the blonde hair. The sweetness of his face. Try to keep Sam from falling apart over it. Like Dean wanted to do.

_Don't get mad at me. Don't you do that. I had to. I had to look out for you. That's my job!_

Yeah, it would be nice to fall apart. Let it go and bury his body next to the wolf-boy. Stop breathing and just let life casually occur without him being there. Without having to feel anymore and just let his heart be truly still.

Dean pulled the door to the bathroom towards him, letting it barely click shut. He glanced across the tiny area. The linoleum on the floor was spic and span. The porcelain on the tub was glossy. Was that a new shower curtain hanging down? He glanced at the second door on the other side of the bathroom leading to bedroom number two. He reached over and softly pushed the lock in, just in case the little girl decided she needed to use the potty while it was occupied. He turned on the shower.

_And what do you think my job is? You saved my life over and over. I mean, you sacrifice everything for me, don't you think I'd do the same thing for you? You're my big brother. There's nothing I wouldn't do for you._

The water started to trickle and slobber on his back and, then, oh so lightly, it rapped onto his damaged left side. It oddly felt good. It was warm and wet and painful which was a welcome change from his usual these days. Elated numbness. Oblivious reality.

This was real. This he could touch. He turned his face into the spray.

WWW

Dean opened the door from the bedroom back into the small living area of the cabin. Sam was snoring logs, hopefully dreaming dreams unknown. Carly was sitting back on the straight chair, brushing at Sam's bangs, evening them out. Dean studied her as he approached them, her fingers lightly grazing the area where Sam's scalp met his forehead, padding sweetly from temple to temple. She gazed at his face, taking in his strong features, the width of his nose, the dimples hidden in his cheeks, the slight jut of his chin. There was an adoration she held in the moment between the two of them that Dean couldn't quite pinpoint. The older man sat in the leather chair and reached for his boots before she seemed to even realize that he was back in the room again.

_It's gonna be another hard night_

_You wanna take it all alone_

_You wanna face up to the trouble_

_You wanna face up to your soul_

Carly glowered at the hunter as he pushed his foot back into the comfort of his boots. "What are you doing?" She watched as Dean bent his leg up easily and started to retie his laces.

"I need to go out for a little while. Get some air."

She was shaking her head. "You can't go out. Not now."

Dean shrugged. "Sam should stay asleep…"

"I'm not talking about Sam. I'm talking about you."

Dean caught her eye as he grabbed for his other boot. She was worried. It wasn't an unfamiliar response, just an unfamiliar person.

"I'll be all right. Can you just stay here with him?" He finished tying his other shoelace and stood, checking his Colt for silver and tugging on his jacket. He reached down and snatched up Sam's shoulder bag.

Carly stood with him, her face scrunched up as she watched Dean handle his gun with such ease. "Yeah," she tried to keep her voice tempered, "I'll stay with him. I'm not dumb enough to go out there." She took a step to her left, blocking Dean from the front door. "You saw what happened to your brother. That wolf, it can do a lot worse." She placed her small hands delicately on his chest and pressed.

_But you can still change your mind_

_You can change your feelings_

_You can change your mind_

_Just hold on tight, everything's gonna be alright_

Dean's eyes narrowed, looking down at Carly, noticing the glimmer of moistness behind the blues. He felt the room grow wintry again, the young woman's hands pressed against him pushing the cold towards his skin.

"What are you doing?" Dean muted.

Carly raised her shoulders nonchalantly. Her voice was faint. "I'm trying to save you."

Dean's head gaped at her and he lost feeling in his toes. He took a shaky step back from the young woman and felt her hands leave his chest, but they were still splayed towards him, still emitting a frosty bite.

_How long did you get?_

_A year… _

"Save me?" He kept the control, kept the fear of hounds at his feet away from ears that might hear. "From what?"

A twinkle of the head towards the door. "From dying."

_I guess I gotta save your ass for a change._

Dean freely stepped around her body. She rocked and rolled with him, not touching any longer, but still connected. Her bare feet and his dusty boots scuffed in a peculiar dance on the wood planks as the older man made his way to the oak entry. Dean reached around his middle and unlocked the smiling door, his eyes staying on the captivating woman.

"T-tell Sam," Dean stammered, "I'll be right back." He swung the door open.

"He'll kill you."

Dean halted at the word.

_He._

His fingers flicked his Colt. It was secure, easy to reach, loaded with silver. He turned, glimpsing back at the blonde, reading her eyes fixed on his. They weren't scared anymore, they were pleading. He turned back into the black of the night.

"Tell Sam."

And he stepped out, being cautious not to exit with a loud slam, leaving Carly in charge of the cabin. In charge of the safety within the warped walls. His whole life left in hers. Dean wasn't sure he could trust her, but he had already. And she had helped when most would have taken the shot. He took a deep breath and reminded himself not everyone on the Earth was evil.

Carly opened the door after him, she watched him take steps on the uneven stairs, inhaling deeply, not looking back and disappearing into the dark. She shied into the cabin's warmth, her body feeling stiff, her heart feeling cold. She looked from left to right, closed the door hard, locked it and pulled the knob. She turned from the entry, her hands pressed against the cold oak wood and she started to rub, keeping count. She looked over to the sleeping body on her old leather sofa. Her mind drifted to the smaller body sleeping in the back bedroom.

She shut her eyes and shook her head, her blonde hair falling around her face. "Stupid hunters."

**Playlist:** _Don't Do Me Like That, Cabin Down Below _and_ You Can Still Change Your Mind_ from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer:** See Chapter One

**Chapter Three: It's Good to be King**

_Dean was sitting in one of the brown leather chairs. He raised the black coffee cup to his lips and blew. He took a long drink and seemed to smile as he gently laid it on the table in between the two chairs. _

_Then he went back to his whittling. The long blade scraped at the old wooden candlestick, shavings of a life never remembered, falling to the floor. Dean stopped and looked at his handy work, pushing the end with his index finger. Almost sharp enough. The silver started grating at the wood again._

"_Dean?" Sam sat up, propped up on his elbows. "What are you doing?" _

_His brother glanced over to the sofa, over the wooden stick. He placed a finger to his lips. "Shh."_

_Tom Petty's voice filled the void. _

It's good to be king, if just for a while

To be there in velvet, yeah, to give 'em a smile…

_Sam's eyes narrowed. The sound of bare feet hitting the hardwood came to his right and he looked over to see Carly gracefully entering the room. She waltzed over to the younger man and placed her hand on top of his head, her fingers tangling on his bed-head hair. _

"_Sam." She smiled down at him and he caught sight of the glossy silver cross hanging down from her neck. She bent down near his ear and nuzzled closely, almost allowing her ears to kiss his lobe. Her voice was meant for only him. "It was you." She pulled away from him and walked back over to his brother, still whittling at the candlestick. _

It's good to be high, and never come down

It's good to be king of your own little town…

"_Sharp enough yet?" she asked, standing like an elegant angel across from the elder Winchester._

_Dean's fingers padded the top. His face broke out in a huge grin and he nodded. _

_Sam pushed up farther. "Are you going hunting?" And then he asked, childishly, "Without me?"_

_Dean and Carly turned to Sam and each placed a finger over their lips. "Shh."_

Yeah, the world would swing if I were king

Can I help it if I still dream time to time…

_The young woman turned back to the stoic hunter as he rose from the leather, her chest heaved towards him as her arms went loose at her sides. Dean's arm raised back and he plunged the homemade stake lovingly into her body, entering between her clavicles and exiting on an angle through her spine. _

_Sam shot off the sofa. "NO!"_

Eyelids flew open and sweat poured off his brow as he sat up, heaving air through his lungs. The pain was torturous on his chest, he lost the fight to sit and settled back on his elbows. His eyes roamed his surroundings, looking for something familiar. The room was dimly lit, surprisingly clean, immaculately put back together again. But it had to be the same cabin. Over in the corner sat the brown leather chair, the black coffee cup sitting on the table and the wooden candlestick nestled on top of a bookcase. Not sharpened. Not a weapon. Just a candlestick.

But there was no beautiful lady with a glossy silver cross hanging around her neck.

And there was no Dean.

"Hello?" Sam called out into the emptiness.

Only one voice answered back.

_It's good to be king and have your own world_

_It helps to make friends, it's good to meet girls_

_A sweet little queen who can't run away_

_It's good to be king, whatever it pays._

WWW

Dean hiked over the dirt mounds surrounding the cabin and back down into the waiting forest. He stopped once as he neared the clearing and looked back the way he had came. The night was jet black and from this distance he could still see a faint glow from where the cabin sat.

From where Sam was. Sleeping. Skin warm and pink, tucked under blankets, building his energy back up. Not cold. Not blue. Not sacrificed so Hell's gates could open up.

No, Sammy was safe. And Dean had a timeline to finish-up.

He turned back around, his boots slipping from underneath him, and let his eyes adjust to the blinding darkness. It should pretty much be a straight shot from the clearing to the wolf-boy's body. The two of them had struggled and landed on the slope just over the hill up head. It would be easier in the dark. Not having to see the expression all over again. Not having to gaze into the half-open eyes. Not have to wonder at all.

Salt and burn… this one was going to be a bitch.

Dean's boots clumped out of the sticky mud and started crunching newly wet grass under his feet once again. He stalked his way forward, keeping his head low, his hand near his weapon, his ears on high alert. The night smelled thick and dewy with hints of lavender and calla lilies. He trudged on, ignoring the magical smell and let his eyes freely dart from the tree lines to the ground. He scanned the area and listened to the foreign noises caused by insects, animals and foliage. He heard an owl hoot. Heard crickets chirping beyond the trees. Heard a croak of a possible toad. All natural. All in all, it was a very calm and quiet night. It felt strangely like he was the only thing alive walking God's green Earth.

The sweet scent seemed to dissipate as he closed in on the hill. Dean's forearm bent up to rub at his nose as the heavy smell of rotting fruit filled his senses. He stopped at the top of the mound and reached for Sam's shoulder bag. The zipper was pulled down silently and Dean reached in and grabbed his flashlight, clicking the beam on. He pointed it in the direction of where he guestimated he and the wolf had fallen.

Short brown grass silhouetted in the soft rays of the light. He veered to the right and then back to the left until a small leg illuminated back to him.

_Shit._

In all honesty, part of him was hoping he – _it_ – wouldn't be there anymore.

Dean's eyes burned from the decaying fruity aroma and he blinked twice as he started down the hill. He swallowed hard forcing the twist of his stomach to release but it only clenched up again. He breathed deeply, listening to the pound of his heart as his boots slid on the wet ground and he quickly regrouped both his nerves and his balance.

_Just make it quick._

And maybe he was hurrying too much, mind wandering, focusing on being somewhere else besides the great outdoors. He was almost to the body when he lost his footing again as he stumbled on a tree root embedded in the soil, protruding up at a most inopportune time. His hands came out in an automatic defense, catching himself from a near hit and miss with the dirt, the flashlight raising quickly in front of him.

An unexpected flash of silver glared back.

Dean stilled, his body going rigid as he slowly brought the top of his falling torso back up. The large white wolf stared at the hunter, its eyes set on his moving body, but not missing the gun. Short, heavy pants exhaled from its blood stained grin. The hefty animal rose onto its four legs, opening the area it had been crouched over. The faint beam from the light shone onto the revolting scene. The wolf-boy's body was laying on its side, where Dean had abandoned it, but now the insides were ripped apart. The small ribcage that had been punctured with the tiny bullet hole now resembled ground hamburger. The older wolf had clawed its way in, ripping flesh and pulling bones until it came to the innards of the long-ago young human. It had ate organs, sucked on tendons and chewed through muscle. Leaving behind the shell of a skinned boy, destined to die a monster.

Dean's fingers slowly wrapped around the hilt of his gun, pulling it out from his waistband. The werewolf snarled and growled, watching him with a careful eye. Steadily, his hand found its way in front of his body and he pointed the barrel towards the animal. He cocked the gun back and set his mark.

The wolf threw its head back, its beautiful white neck elongating into ripples of soft skin as it let out a high pitched howl. It was piercing and full of pain, anguish as it lowered its head back down to defiantly leer at the hunter. It jumped over the young body as Dean fired the gun, the bullet whizzing by the lean muscles above the left shoulder, just missing the wolf's taught flesh. The wolf hit the ground in a hard run, its paws having to make purchase only twice until it was on top of the ordinary man. Bastard, thinking he could be fast enough. Thinking he could be smart enough. Thinking he could be enough, period. The wolf had seen people like this before. Pointing guns loaded with silver bullets at it. People just like this, thinking to themselves, all they ever needed was one shot. Thinking that they were superhuman. When there wasn't anything super about them at all.

They were all just normal.

The werewolf was over six feet tall on its hind legs, weighing close to two hundred pounds, most of it muscle. Toppling the athletic human was, well, a piece of cake. Using its paws and body mass to force the weapon out of his hands was effortlessly-thought out. The wolf snapped its jaws at the man, just-in-case he still had doubts who was king of this forest. There would be no scratches inflicted, no wasting time in clawing at Elmer Fudd's sides. The wolf was in desperate need for this kill. Revenge for the death of its family behind him. A heart to devour to keep its kind alive. Survival of the fittest.

Stupid hunters.

There was no time to grab his knife. Dean's head turned as his back skipped against sticks and rocks, the dark grass hiding the Colt from his sight. He was up a creek with no plan and no weapons. He'd have to fight dirty.

Dean's hands wrapped around the wolf's neck and his fingers clutched rolls of heavy skin. He pushed his thumbs in as hard as he could, hoping to snap the fragile bones within. Or at least suffocate it. Slowly and painfully.

The sounds of the owl seemed to close in on him, the crickets were certainly marching just a few feet away. And that was _definitely_ a toad croaking, encouraging him to keep pressing.

The wolf pulled back, stretching Dean's arms with it until sharp pains shot from his hands to his shoulders. But he didn't let go. The animal twitched its head from the left to the right, snapping its maw, trying to get in reach of the man's arms. It lunged forward and back, locking Dean's elbows as it pulled back and then almost breaking them as it plummeted forward. The wolf pushed and tugged, dragging the man past the small leftover body of the dead, back down the hill.

Dean couldn't keep this up for much longer. He was tiring, the world was spinning into the black and he was losing his grip. The weight above him knew it, too. The strength it possessed, the feral in its eyes spoke its dinner plans. It was just a matter of time.

Dean thought about his blade stuffed in his sheath on his belt. He could let go with his right hand and see how fast his reflexes were against the animal. Then again, living still sounded pretty good.

He took a deep breath and tucked his legs in as far as the beast would allow. He gave himself a slow mental count. On three he'd let go and push with his legs, hopefully sending the wolf off balance, giving him enough time to grab his knife. He constricted his eyes and pulled the wolf back, locking his elbows. Its body writhed under Dean's strong hold as the hunter's legs folded in as close to his body as possible.

_One._ The owl had quieted. _Two._ The crickets were hushed. _Three._ The toad was silent.

Dean let go of the large neck and pushed ferociously with his legs, letting out a guttural yell as he did. The wolf's body came free from the hunter and Dean reached down with his hand to grab his knife. He was on his hind haunches, crouching low, steel gripped in his right, looking up to the animal positioned on all fours.

That's when he saw it.

It moved quickly, a flash of light out of his periphery at first and it grew brighter as it approached. The wolf was no longer fixated on the man and was now snarling and scuffling towards the beam. It stayed at a safe distance, dancing near the trees, teasing the wolf to beckon near it. Pastel colors intertwined through its body as the werewolf turned its lean body and headed for the light in a race against itself. The blur darted in and out of the tree lines until it disappeared through the tall Evergreens. The old werewolf speedily on its tail.

Dean blinked. _What the fuck?_ He stood to his feet, a bit rocky and shaken and placed the knife back in its protective sheath. He looked back up the hill and could see his flashlight, still on, the light pointing to his gun. He climbed the mound back up and grabbed both of his utensils, panning the area until he saw the wolf-boy's body. Sam's shoulder bag was resting near it and Dean clumsily walked the distance and started to unscrew the cap off the salt.

WWW

Sam had made it to his feet and had carefully walked into the kitchen. He held his middle with his left hand as he reached with his right for a glass off the top shelf of the cabinets. He hissed through his teeth as he retrieved a smooth pink glass down from above. He filled it with some ice from the newer freezer and then remembered he probably shouldn't use the tap water. He looked around and saw a large jug of water sitting on the floor. The thought of the pain attacking his body from the pull of the jug was enough to make him wince.

Then he remembered the young woman who had been here with the hunters. And the cleanliness of the joint. And didn't those pink hand towels hanging on the stove seem to match the pink glass? Someone was use to coming to this cabin. And they came prepared.

He reached over and pulled the refrigerator door open. Rows of small bottles of water. Sam abandoned the pink glass and pulled out a small bottle. He twisted off the cap and walked back into the living room, sitting back on the couch.

He saw the silver sheers still resting on the coffee table, saw his shoes placed so neatly against the wall, saw the iPod on top of the record player. He didn't see any traces of blood, however. Didn't see his ruined t-shirt thrown anywhere. Besides the scissors, everything else was cleaned up.

_Don't come around here no more…_

Sam had the feeling, although all was still and calm, he wasn't quite alone. He got back up and walked towards the small hallway, where he knew the bedrooms were. He looked to the right and to the left. Both doors were shut.

_Whatever you're looking for_

_Hey, don't come around here no more…_

He turned the knob on the door to the right and pushed it open slowly with his fingertips. It creaked open and inside sat the brown leather chair, next to its table with a large 1960's clock radio. Books stacked high, mint green rug warming the floor, orchids hitting his senses. Everything was dusted and polished and quiet.

_I don't feel you anymore_

_You darken my door…_

Sam shut the door with a small click and looked to the door on the left. He took a sideways step towards the closed frame, feeling the air thicken as he approached. His breath slowed as he felt his lungs struggling. _Must be the damn stitches._

_Stop walking down my street_

_Who do you expect to meet?_

Sam halted in front of the door and reached for the knob. He shook his head, trying to clear it from the fog that seemed to be building around him. The pain lit on fire across his belly as he felt blood oozing through young sutures. He wiped away the pinkish crimson with his finger and thinned his lips together. The gashes on his chest…

_Shit. The boy. _

He turned his head in the direction behind him. _Where was Dean?_ He started away from the second door when he thought he heard something on the other side. It lasted briefly, but it was low and throaty. A growl. He wiped the blood from his finger off onto his jeans and reached for the knob. He turned it once and the smoothness slid right out of his palm. It was locked.

_Whatever you're looking for_

_Hey, don't come around here no more._

Sam let out a sigh. If there was somebody in the room, chances were they were sleeping. And if they were sleeping, chances were that person wouldn't be his brother. He fisted his fingers inside of his hand and reached up to knock on the wood.

The rapping was harder and louder than expected and Sam jumped at the sound. His fist unraveled and he walked back down the hallway out into the living room. The knocking was getting more rapid, almost pounding against the oak from the outside. Sam reached the front door and looked out the peephole. His brother standing under the night sky, leaning tiredly against the frame, was staring back at him.

Sam unlocked the door immediately and let it swing open. Dean came barreling through into the small living area of the cabin.

"Dean?" The younger brother watched as the older man stumbled in and threw the shoulder bag on the floor.

"Sam?" Dean's voice broke. "What're you doin' up?"

Sam smiled a little at the unspoken concern. "I needed a drink."

Dean was already moving. In the kitchen first, yanking the pink hand towels down and dousing them with water from the jug that Sam couldn't bare to pick up. He turned to his brother and met him with his hands, pushing him on his back, on his shoulders, back in the direction he had came.

"Dean…"

Dean ignored him. "You're bleeding, Sam. You get up, you're going to ruin the stitches."

Sam was being lowered back down to the couch. "Couldn't have that," he mumbled.

Dean crouched down. His face turned in a scowl. "You know how long it took me to fix you up?"

Sam swallowed. Dean's hands came at him with the wet towel. Sam grabbed it away from him. "I can do it," he protested.

Dean tried to grab it back. "Yeah, well…" Dean stopped and flicked his eyes up. Sam had just died a couple of weeks ago. _Died._ And Dean had been left alone. Left to do what their Dad had taught them, but not left to fulfill his promise. You can't save your brother when you're the last man standing.

_You have to save Sam…_

And now, there was warm, red blood bubbling out from his brother and he was arguing with him, yelling at being treated like a child. This… this was a great improvement. There were lots of things Dean wanted to comment on. Insults he could throw. Lots of reasons to point out why he should take over. Instead he sighed, letting go of his heat and he gently pulled the washcloth out of Sam's hands. "You lost some blood, Sammy. Just… just let me take a look."

Sam tried to relax, removing his arms from his abdomen, and he discovered his breaths were coming easier all of a sudden. He watched as his older brother leaned in, pressing the cold cloth to his skin. His face grimaced at the sensation of the temperature change and then he felt the heat from Dean's hand seep through and his skin was warming again.

Three-hundred-forty-nine days left. Then it would all be cold.

Dean could feel his younger brother's eyes boring holes into him. He glanced up as he checked the small leakage and then pressed the towel back down. He reached around the sofa for the duffel and unzipped it. He removed one of the bottled waters he had packed and showed it to Sam.

"Didn't have to wander around the house for a drink, he commented firmly.

He pulled out a roll of gauze and 4X4 dressings to aide them. He should have wrapped Sam up before, but that would have required rolling an unconscious patient. He pulled the hand towel away and waited a few seconds for his chest to air dry. He could still feel the eyes, though.

"What is it, Sam?"

A brief hesitation followed by a long overdue release of air. "Where were you?"

Dean placed the 4X4's over the stitches and started to tenderly tape his brother. "Had to get some air."

"With salt and lighter fluid?"

Dean glanced over his shoulder at the bag by the door.

"You take care of it?" Sam's voice was small.

Dean proceeded with the 4X4's. He nodded once.

"You see the other one?"

Dean unrolled the gauze and positioned the tip on Sam's upper torso. He leaned his own body closer to his brother and brought both hands up, holding the gauze secure as he angled down, wrapping around Sam's back and then to his front again. "Yeah, I saw it," Dean answered in his ear as he continued the cycle of white.

Sam's body swayed to and fro from his big brother. One second Dean's shoulder was pressing against him and then it was gone. It was making him sea sick. He wanted Dean to stop and just leave the jagged edges alone, let it be a reminder to him of what he had done. He wanted Dean to stop and look him in the eye and tell him it would be okay. That is was just a werewolf. That he would done the same thing. That Sam wasn't a monster for killing a boy. He wanted Dean to stop and pull him close. Tell him he was sorry. He shouldn't have made the deal. "You kill it?"

Dean shook his head. "No, something chased it away from me."

"What?" Sam was stunned. Almost as stunned as Dean was. "What could have chased a werewolf away?"

Dean ripped off some tape and applied it to the wrappings, keeping anything sticky from the stitches, but making sure it wouldn't come loose. "It wasn't Bugs Bunny, if that's what you're asking."

"Dean…"

"I don't know what it was, Sam." Dean sat back and grabbed one of Sam's shirts, nodding with him to put his arms through. "It moved too fast."

Sam's head popped out of the shirt opening. "Like a Wendigo?"

Dean shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe…" and then he mumbled, "I don't remember them glowing, though."

"It… glowed?"

"Like it was radioactive or something."

Sam's eyes slid away, thinking back to what he had seen. It had been too quick. He let out a slight gasp. "It wasn't on fire, right?" He could remember the light, it was engaging…

Dean shook his head. "No, it was glowing. Definitely not on fire. It was like a really bright light."

"It wasn't after you, though. It was… like it was trying to protect you?"

"I wasn't afraid of it." Dean pulled back and sat back on the coffee table.

Sam watched as his brother's shoulders fell forward. He could see the exhaustion rolling off of him, Dean being the bait on most of their hunts now. Dean wanting to take center stage, while pushing Sam out of the way. Dean not caring what happened to him, only caring about what happened to Sam. And Sam wanting to both punch him and hug him for it. "You said you'd be here when I woke up."

Dean winced. "Sorry 'bout that. But I told Carly…" Dean looked behind him, his eyes coasting to the kitchen. "Where's Carly?"

Sam looked at him, his hands coming up. "Who?"

"The lady who owns this cabin."

Sam sat up more. "You mean the one who had your shotgun?"

Dean stood and stalked towards the hallway. "Yeah, that one." He looked back at Sam. "She wasn't here when you woke up?"

Sam shook his head. He watched Dean start towards the door on the right. "I already looked back there. There's no one there."

Dean stopped and looked across to the door on the left.

"And that one's locked."

Dean pointed at the other door. "This one is? It's locked?"

Sam nodded. "Yeah." He stood up, feeling the pain down to his toes. "Why?"

Dean glowered at Sam, silently scolding him for standing up. The kid was going to rip the stitches out one way or the other. "Carly has a five-year-old little girl who was sleeping in there."

Sam walked to his brother, keeping his voice low. "Did she say if she had a dog, too?"

"No," Dean answered, not sure if he wanted to ask. "Why?"

Sam gulped. _Oh, God._ "Because I heard something growl at me when I tried the door."

The brothers' eyes met, their faces paled and each silently spoke the same fear. The werewolf. Inside the bedroom. With the five-year-old.

Dean's arms spread across the width of the hallway, pushing Sam behind him as he set his stance, ready to bring is boot up and break the door down. There was a light clacking sound from the knob as he faltered, awkwardly leaving his body to balance on one leg. The door slowly crept open and Carly started to emerge from the darkness beyond. She looked at the hunters, one behind his brother, the other looking like he was in the middle of a strange dance move.

"Who do you think you are?" Carly's voice was accusing. She stepped into the hallway. "Ralph Macchio and Pat Morita?"

Dean looked confused and then noticed his body form was stuck in mid-air in the shape of a crane. He lowered his leg and his arms. Carly closed the door behind her and motioned the boys away from the corner, back into the living area.

Sam sat down on the sofa, with Dean sitting opposite him on one of the leather chairs. Carly looked at the trail of mud from the hallway through the living area and back to the older brother.

She frowned. "Boots."

Dean toed off his boots and shoved them to the side of the chair as Carly went into the kitchen. There was a loud grunting sound from the sink as the boys saw the woman holding the pink glass with ice in it. She rattled the ice together and then dumped them down the drain, drying the glass and returning it to its spot in the cabinet. She moved so gracefully, she almost seemed to glide back in the living area with soaked paper towels in her hands. When she sat down, she held herself like a queen. She picked up one of the boots and wiped it clean of the caked on muck. Then she started untying the laces.

"You made it back alive." Her voice sounded almost disinterested, certainly not surprised. Her fingers flew over the shoestrings and she put the boot down on the floor and grabbed at the other one.

Dean ignored the comment. "Where were you?"

She looked up from cleaning the boot. "Eliza woke up after you left and got scared. I was just comforting her until she fell back to sleep." She started back on the laces. "I left the scissors next to Sam, if he needed to… you know… defend himself against anything. I heard you come in. The two of you were so noisy… I thought Liza would never go back to sleep."

"I heard something growl at me through the door," Sam piped up. Carly's fingers were done with the knots and she laid the boot down with its mate, lining them up perfectly. She looked over to the younger man and met his fully awake eyes. One thing was clear: Sam Winchester didn't believe her story.

"It was Eliza," she answered honestly. "She doesn't like it here and… she has ways of expressing herself that can be considered odd to most."

"Like growling?"

"Yeah. And other things." She looked away then, leaving it open-ended. Not wanting to discuss the temper-tantrums of an unruly five-year-old. She rose from the chair and walked the short distance to the kitchen. She came back and handed Dean the broom and dustpan. A quick look at the mud adorning her floor and Dean grudgingly got up.

"You look horribly tired," Carly directed to Sam.

Sam shrugged. He knew he was pale, he had almost no life left in him, and he wanted to sleep for days. But his heart was beating and his lungs were filling. That was something that his brother had made sure of. No evil son of a bitch was going to take him from his brother's arms. Human or not.

Carly walked to the front door and opened it, looking left and right, shutting it hard and bolting it, tugging on the knob.

"You cleaned this place up?" Sam asked.

She sighed. Same questions, different brother. "Yes." She unlocked the door.

"It looks nice."

Dean kept sweeping, watching Sam watch Carly.

"Thanks." She opened the door, looked outside, shut the door hard and locked it, pulling on the knob. She unlocked the door again.

Sam's eyes narrowed and he sat up, more alert. "Is there something wrong?"

Dean chuckled to himself.

The woman's head came back in and she shut the door behind her, locking it again and giving it a tug. "I don't know."

Sam waited and watched her go through the ritual two more times. "You know…" he began as she locked the door, "my brother and I are skilled hunters. You're safe in here."

Carly turned from the closed door and pressed her hands to the cold oak. She started rubbing.

Sam waited. He shot a look at Dean who was just finishing the floor, standing with his full dustpan. He still wasn't sure what the magic number was. But she always reached it.

She pushed away from the entry and picked up the shoulder bag off the floor. "From the wolf? Is that what you thought was in my daughter's room?" She put the smaller bag on top of the duffel and hid them away, behind the sofa.

Dean came back in the living area from discarding the dirt and mud. The floor was clean. "We didn't know what it was," Dean answered, sinking into the chair again attempting to lean back.

Carly sat opposite of them, her hands held tightly in her lap, her back tall, her ass hanging on the edge. "You can't jump to conclusions."

Sam nodded to the door. "Apparently, you can't be too safe, either. If the wolf comes to the cabin, he won't get in."

Her mouth twitched and she smiled sweetly at the younger man. "I know that." She took a breath and let it exhale, gazing at Sam again, the same hold Dean had noticed she had possessed with him earlier. "Have we met before?"

Sam startled at the question, his eyes narrowing. Her looked her up and down. She was fair-skinned, her eyes strangely pulling him to her. He had to blink prior to answering. "I don't think so." He knew he'd remember her, if he had.

"Swear we have. We had a conversation, I think."

Sam thought about it, nothing coming to mind.

"Huh. Maybe in a different time, then."

"A different time?"

"A different life. Maybe we've met before." She yawned then. A bit exaggerated, her arms reaching over her head. "It's getting late…"

Sam threw a nod. "Guess you can go lay down with your daughter. Try to sleep. Dean and I will bunk out here. You'll be safe."

Her eyes hardened and Sam felt a cold draft float across the room. "But, will you be?"

Dean felt the sudden change in the temperature, he sat upright, his hand brushing the butt of his gun. "Carly?"

She closed her eyes, her brown lashes resting gently on her upper cheeks. When she opened them again, the blue was warm and inviting and the room seemed to light up. "It won't get me."

She got up from the chair and walked back to the door and unlocked it. Her head darted into the night and she came back in, shutting it hard, bolting it and pulling hard. She suddenly felt squeezing and she was spinning.

"Stop, Carly." Dean's hands had wrapped around her frail shoulders and he spun the woman around. Her hands pressed to the wood and started to rub.

She glared at the man, her hands still moving. Deep blue eyes turned to ice. Dean took a breath, waiting for the woman to still. Her hands came to a stop and she hung her head down, her blonde hair brushing against her cheeks, shading her fine features.

"Carly?"

She looked back up, her gaze puzzling to the older man. "What did you do when you left here?"

Dean held tight to her shoulders. He thought about his response. Wondered what she already knew. "The reason I had to go out tonight…"

"I know _why_ you went out."

Dean exhaled. Carly's chest rose and fell with his, her fruity breath hitting his face. He didn't speak to her. He waited her out.

"You were hunting." She ducked under his arm and wiggled free of the hold he had on her. The young woman walked regally back to her chair, still rigid, not looking at either unwanted guest.

"Yeah," Dean followed her back to the seating arrangement. He caught a glance at Sam who was sitting with his arms open, gray t-shirt covering his body wrapped in gauze. He wasn't going anywhere and he was ready to listen. "Sam and I are hunters and tonight I went out to hunt the wolf." It wasn't a lie but it wasn't the truth and Dean felt Sam's eyes travel to his brother and accused him of things not able to mention at the moment.

"You get it?"

Dean looked back to Carly. Something told him she already knew the answer. "No."

She nodded.

"But, Carly?"

Her head swiveled and she sat back, taking both brothers into her sight at the same time.

"I think there's something else out there in woods. Besides the… wolf."

Both boys unknowingly, simultaneously held their breath.

And then Carly let out an abrupt laugh. It was short and unnerving. Her eyes lit up and she sat higher. "Well, yeah."

Dean rubbed his hands together and Sam swallowed. Carly's blues shot from one to the other, her own hand rubbing the goose bumps on her arm.

Sam's chest ached, his patience was wearing thin. "What's out there, Carly?"

She pushed out of her chair and walked the distance to the door, peeking out the peephole into the dead of night. She hesitated at the lock, watching it with her eyes, not touching with her fingers and she turned slowly back to the men. Her voice sounded sad and personal when she finally answered.

"A monster."

**Playlist:** _It's Good to be King_ and _Don't Come Around Here No More_ performed by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer:** See Chapter One

**Chapter Four: You Wreck Me**

"A monster?"

Dean thought back to the clearing. The werewolf hovering over him, evil fermenting from its breath. And then the bright, white light.

It hadn't felt like a monster. It had felt like a security blanket, protecting, not harming. It had saved him.

_I'm trying to save you._

Dean's eyes focused on the young woman. He'd met all kinds of monsters. Even ones who were really good at disguising themselves.

"What kind of a monster is it?"

She released a long breath and her cheek reflexively crept up. "You're never going to believe me…"

A sharp cry from behind the trio sounded surprisingly close. A child's yelp for her mother and the sound of a door opening.

"Mama?"

Both sets of Winchester shoulders jumped at the unfamiliar, young sound. Their heads whipped at the same time to see sweet Eliza standing in her white nightgown, golden locks messed from sleep, rubbing at her five-year-old eyes. She looked like a stereotypical cherub. She dropped her small, chubby fists, blinked a few times and gaped at the men taking over the small living room. Her pale blues widened and she found her mother quickly, her orbs huge with wonderment.

"Mama?"

Carly was on her feet before either man could take a breath. She opened her arms and greeted her child with a hug. "It's okay, Eliza. This is Dean and Sam. They're hunters and they got lost in the woods and needed a place to sleep tonight."

Eliza buried her head, inching her cheeks to the side and letting her eyes take a peek at the strangers.

"These are the boys who were making all the noise out here earlier," Carly went on.

Eliza glanced up at her mother and she seemed to relax. Her blues flashed back to the living room, darting from one brother to the other. They fixed and settled on Sam, her pupils constricting. Her nose inhaled quickly as she sucked in her top lip. She tugged on her mother's yellow band shirt, not breaking her stare with the younger brother. Her voice was throaty and wet as she growled out, "Wolf."

Sam's brows furrowed as Carly's hands gently touched the child's shoulders. "Come on, Eliza. Let's get you back to bed. Mama will lay down with you."

The young woman directed the girl back down the short hallway and through the open door on the left. It clicked softly shut.

Sam glanced over at his brother and let out a small huff.

Dean's eyes bounced over. "What?"

"She's growled at me and called me a wolf." He flicked his fingers up in the air, to stress each point.

Dean looked back to the empty hallway. "Something feel off with you?"

Sam nodded his response as Dean set his attention back to his brother. Sam looked rugged, scruffy, just plain worn out. The kid needed to sleep.

Dean got up and walked to the duffel grabbing at a bottle of Tylenol. He shook three tablets out and offered them up to Sam. They younger man accepted, washing them down with his water.

"What's up with the Carly and the door?" Sam asked. "And the cleaning?"

Dean shrugged. "OCD?" He extended his hand down to his brother. "Get up. I gotta pull the bed out."

Sam stood modestly, accepting the help. He turned to remove one of the sofa cushions, but Dean abruptly slapped his hand away.

"Got it."

He heard Sam interject something snide under his breath, but he took a step back. Dean grabbed at the black ribbon handle and yanked the folded mattress out.

"What're they sleeping on?" Sam suddenly perked up, recalling the layout of the other bedroom.

Dean pushed the mattress down, there was a fitted sheet already attached and from the looks and smell of it, it was clean. As were the extra linens in the closet they had stored the duffel in yesterday. Dean sighed. Carly had been expecting friends to arrive. Extra blankets, clean sheets, lots of food and water. Her imperfect perfectionism would have her being _more_ than prepared.

"Dunno. It's part of the mystery," Dean replied. "How'd she get the place so clean?" He brought over two pillows and threw them towards the top of the makeshift bed, stopping only to shut the iPod off. When he couldn't figure it out, he turned the volume down so Tom could continue to play his loop in silence. "She's Mary Poppins?"

Sam shimmied out of his jeans as Dean tossed him over a pair of sweat pants. Sam ping-pong ideas back to his bother. "How'd she get all that food and water here? There isn't a road that comes down to the cabin." He threw his jeans back to Dean and settled down on his side of the bed.

Dean had dressed into his own sleeping clothes and crawled in on the other side. He pulled the covers up over he and Sam. "What was the light?"

Sam's head searched for a comfortable spot on the soft downy that was stuffed inside the pillow. "Tinkerbell?"

Dean snickered. "Nah, she's a pixie. This wasn't a fairy." He threw his hand over his head as he laid on his back. Laying down felt unbelievable. He was ready to relinquish his body to the night. He glanced over once at Sam, his sibling's eyes were half-mast, staring blankly into the kitchen.

"Need anything?" Dean had forgotten to ask before he got into bed.

Sam's head moved left to right.

Dean waited. "What is it?"

Sam turned his neck. His brother was within reaching distance. His brother was asking how he was. His brother was wanting to figure out this hunt. His brother was wanting to walk through the next few months like nothing was wrong. Nothing was changed. Only, Sam could feel the forces pull them. Especially in the night. One being pulled towards the gates of hell, the other being pulled to the darkness beyond. One being pulled because of choice the other being pulled because he was chosen.

"It's quiet here." Sam's voice was flat.

Dean looked back up at the ceiling. It was quiet. He could hear his heartbeat, though. It was pounding in his ears. He couldn't believe Sam couldn't hear it, too. "It's kind of nice."

Sam shifted his body next to him. "I don't want to get use to it. It's too loud."

"What is?"

"The quiet." Pretty soon, everything was going to be quiet. Lonely. And there's nothing else that screams louder than that.

Dean swallowed. Yeah, he had went through a few hours of quiet. He couldn't handle the cry of his own voice, either.

_What am I suppose to do?_

Sam took a few deep breaths and closed his eyes, his hands finding their spot next to his sides and his body sinking into the thin mattress. "Wonder Woman?" he slurred to Dean.

Sam's older brother was turning to his side, feeling the intoxicating sensation of sleep warm over him. He was so grateful for the break.

"Dude, she was _hot._"

WWW

_Dean was sitting in the brown leather chair, whittling at the candlestick. The silver from his blade meeting the oblong sides as they splintered to the floor. _

_Sam sat up on his elbows and watched. His brother didn't acknowledge him. He just kept whittling. He'd stop from time to time and pad the end with his fingertip but he didn't look up. So Sam waited for the bare feet to slap on the hardwood. For Carly to come waltzing in and take the brunt of the instrument as she had done before. _

_Or maybe he could just wake up. _

_But it was too quiet. Save for the blade scraping against the wood. And his brother's heartbeat, pulsing in his chest. That was something the younger man could hear. _

_Sam cleared his throat. "You think you're sharpening a pencil there? I don't think it has any lead," he tried to joke._

_Dean's eyes drifted up. They seemed to look right through Sam. "No, I'm making a weapon."_

_Sam gulped. "You're making a stake?"_

_Dean stood up and took a couple of steps towards him. "Yep."_

_Sam looked to his right. There was Carly standing off to the side. She was under a large tree with a hollowed out trunk. But she didn't look over. She was already looking up. _

_He frowned back to Dean. The hunter was hovering over Sam's immobile form. "Are we going hunting?"_

_His brother's smile was small this time and he ticked his head to the right. "Not tonight."_

"_Who'd you make the stake for, Dean?" _

_Dean released the air inside his lungs. "Me."_

_And he forged the wooden candlestick into his gut. _

Sam woke up pouring sweat. His eyes were scared and searching. His body shot pain through his ribs as it instinctively folded into a sitting position. His brother's name was on the tip of his tongue.

God, this was getting old.

Dean was already awake and was sitting in the brown leather chair, just as in his dreams, staring at him. "Sam?" Concern with a hint of so much more underlying.

Sam's throat worked. He slowly nodded to the opposite chair. "Could you sit over there?" Nothing else to give at the moment, just the request without reasons why.

Dean didn't ask, either. He simply got up and switched chairs. His arms rested on his knees and he leaned forward. "Better?"

A small shudder waved through Sam's body but he nodded. In all honestly, it was better.

"Nightmare?"

Sam threw the covers off himself. It felt so hot in the cabin. He hadn't remembered that from last night.

"Yeah." His back was to Dean, but he could feel the eyes. Feel the waiting.

"Wanta talk 'bout it?"

_Yes_. He wanted to yell about it. He wanted to shake his brother, knock him out, beg him to reverse the deal. He wanted to tell him _he_ was the one that needed to die. That Dean was wrong. It was the wrong decision. He chose the wrong brother to live.

"No."

Sam's eyes focused on a picture hanging on the wall, opposite of him. It was a reprint of Matteo di Giovanni's, _The Massacre of the Innocents_. His forehead wrinkled as he stared at the inhumane illustration. He hadn't even noticed it before as he went to bed last night. It was a grotesque scene with crying children, slaughtered by men with swords. The mothers weeping, pulling their babies away from the murderers. It made him shiver. He stared at it, seeing his face on all the hunters' bodies and the children fearing him.

"That painting creeps me out." Dean was always watching.

Couldn't argue with him there. "Yeah." The younger brother stood and turned to look at the fold-out bed. He reached down to help return it back to the confinements of the sofa.

"Go get cleaned up," Dean spoke up. He watched as Sam still stared at the rumpled sheets, lost somewhere. "I'll get the room put back together before Carly wakes up." He waited with still no response from his little brother. "It was a long night, dude. You reek."

Smell did it as the quiet man lifted his head and started a slow shuffle around the bed. Dean already had his clothes pulled out, ready for Sam to take. "Right bedroom and keep it down. We want to be respectful."

Sam looked at him, a bit perplexed, but he took the clean clothes and nodded. He started towards the hallway and then turned around. Dean was removing the blankets off the thin mattress and smoothing the fitted sheet out.

"You woulda… done the same thing?" He echoed the older man's words back to him. He knew what the answer would be, but he desperately needed to hear it. Needed for Dean to say it: He would have taken the shot.

Dean's hands stilled over the sheets. He looked up and met Sam with confidence, unwavering and, without hesitation, "I would."

Sam seemed to take a few seconds to let that sink in, to let himself believe his brother.

Dean never moved, just held the connection. To save Sam, Dean would have taken the shot. He stared, silently driving it home: _I would have done the same thing. _

_In a heartbeat. _

Sam turned without speaking and walked back through the door on the right. He left his brother to clean up his mess and try to pick up the pieces. Once again.

Carefully, Sam unwrapped the gauze from his body and gently pulled off the 4X4's. His torso was red, swollen in some areas, heat radiating throughout. He took off his sweat pants and looked at the scratches on his thighs. The larger wolf had literally laid his paws into him.

He discarded his boxers, relieved his bladder and reached up to turn on the nozzle. The water pressure was not impressive, but beggars couldn't be choosers. Sam stepped into the light spray and let it try to heal him. He watched the water running down the drain turn from clear to gray to pink. Dirt and blood made their way down his legs. Tears made their way down his face. Easier this way with the small spout of water to cover them up.

His face cracked from the pressure in his head, his face distorting from the force of keeping sound inside. The fact remained the same - no matter what Dean would have done, it was Sam that had done it.

He had killed a boy.

There was no God that would forgive that.

The water washed his body until it ran clear again. But his soul… for that, that water just wasn't enough.

WWW

Dean had easily found some bread and had toasted up a light breakfast for the two of them. He cleaned his work area off and hoped Carly wouldn't mind him using her things without asking permission first. _She probably counts the slices of bread, too_, he thought.

Sam had emerged from the shower looking clean and smelling better but he was off synch and Dean recognized the slumped shoulders and the slow gait wasn't just from the attack.

No, his brother was hurting.

They sat together in silence, eating toast with jam and drinking bottled water from their own stash. Dean gnawed on a jerky stick while Sam peeled back a banana. They had heard the shower turn on right after Sam had finished and had listened to the occasional whisper that vented into the room. The giggles were what got them, though. Young Eliza had an infectious laugh. It sounded like it started in her belly and worked its way up her throat, trilling her sing-song vocal chords until it released. It was a sweet melody that ended on an upturned note chased by sugary inhalations as she started the laughter again.

Not the usual noise they were use to when they woke up. It was genuinely infantry music, but it made their lips turn up in smiles.

They heard the click of the door from the back bedrooms and the delicate pitter-pat of bare feet on the hardwood.

Dean took a drink of his water as Carly and Eliza came into view of the hunters. The child clung closely to her mother's legs, her blonde curls mimicking the softness of the woman she inherited them from.

Sam and Dean smiled to her at the same time. Both men purposely greeted the girl first with high-pitched "Hi, there's" and "How are you's" tumbling out of their mouths at nearly the same time.

Eliza eventually smiled, one tooth in the front missing, her own sweet dimples gracing her rounded face. She shook her head when Carly offered her something to eat, choosing just a glass of chocolate milk instead. She pulled back a chair and sat with the men while they finished their toast, her eyes glistening from one to the other, watching with a childlike fascination at the foreigners in her presence. She finished the milk and walked by Dean to put her glass in the sink. Her face sparkled as she grinned at Sam, looking at him with delight this time, not oddly accusing like the short hours before.

Carly pushed her gently into the other room, giving her plain typing paper and crayons, asking for her to draw her a picture.

"I want to play outside."

Carly shook her head. "Not yet." She patted the blonde curls. "Soon." She settled her daughter on the leather sofa and turned up the volume of the iPod, the Heartbreakers accompanying Mr. Petty's off-tune voice in the background.

_Every time it seems like there ain't nothin' left no more_

_I find myself having to reach out and grab hold of something…_

The young woman walked back into the dinette, her dark jeans hanging loosely on her skinny legs. She stared at the men, her arms crossed over her tight, red t-shirt sporting the _Kinks_ logo in white.

"Hey, Carly," Sam started, trying not to sound like he was being intrusive, "is there another road around here that leads to the cabin that we missed? I mean, we had to walk almost two miles and… how'd you get all this water and food here?" Sam turned his body around in the chair so he could see her.

"Secretly? I'm Lara Croft."

_Here comes my girl. Here comes my girl. _

_Yeah, and she looks so right, she is all I need tonight._

Sam's face dimpled and Dean let out a laugh. They looked at one another and Sam watched Dean's eyebrows raise. "Yeah, she's got Wonder Woman beat."

Carly was smiling, too. "No, I keep supplies in the cellar, under the cabin. I have a four wheeler to get through the brush to carry everything else. And Eliza, of course. But I parked next to your car up on the road's end. Black '67 Impala?"

Dean's entire aura lit up and he sat more alert. "That's her."

"Well, I saw the car and thought I might have some other guests joining me. People hunt these woods all the time and every so often, they can't find their way back."

"So, you kind of figured out we were hunters?" Sam pushed for more.

Carly nodded. "Bad-ass car like that? I figured it belonged to someone compensating for something."

Dean's face fell, thinking about the comment. Sounded like an insult…

"Did you figure out how we know each other?" She directed to Sam.

He hadn't even thought about it since they had last talked. "No."

She pointed her finger in his direction. "I'm going to remember. You were there. There was… a tree?"

"Where?"

She thought about it a minute. "Maybe it was a dream." Then her eyes caught the empty plates in front of them. "Had enough to eat or should I make you more?"

Four large hands came out in protest. The brothers were shaking their heads and answering her with firm "No's."

Carly huffed a small laugh at them, causing the right side of her bangs to wisp up from her breath. Her lips pierced together and she gently blew on the left side as well.

The boys didn't miss the peculiarity and their faces didn't hide the fact.

She simply shrugged. "Has to… balance." She almost sounded embarrassed. Her fingers traced the soft edges of her neck ever so subtly as she twisted and twirled the chain of her necklace. She stopped over the glossy cross, her fingertips gliding over the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost.

Sam had been watching her intently. The way she moved, her hands, her body. She was enticing.

"Do you believe?" He asked. "Or is that just a fashion statement?"

Carly glanced down at the ornament hanging between her breast bone. "What? No, I mean, of course I believe."

Sam nodded at her. She said it with such certainty, such safety that this he believed.

Carly continued, "He always has a plan. When everything else is spinning out of control, God is there. You have to have faith or else… why is life worth it?" She tilted her head, her sight soaking up both brothers again. "You know?" She waited, watching them exchange opposite looks and she read the conversation. Both were believers. Just, only one had the faith to believe in the possibility of a God. The other believed in what he saw, what he touched, what he lived. His faith had been taken from him long ago.

Carly changed the subject.

"What's the plan today?"

Dean lifted his eyebrows. "If it's okay with you, I'd thought I'd try to hunt the wolf one more time. If I could leave Sam here…"

"What?" Sam's head snapped up.

Dean glared, his hand raising. "Not like I can bring you along."

"I can walk."

"Barely."

"I can shoot a gun."

"Steady?"

Sam narrowed his eyes. He was NOT going to be left behind. Left here to play Barbie dolls with a couple of girls.

Dean shook his head. "I don't know if you can hit your mark, Sam. Damn thing moves fast. I don't want you shooting me."

Sam's face dropped. He sucked in a shallow breath and held it, his cheeks flushing from the burn behind his eyes. He watched his big brother as he drew silent, his air leaving his lips trying to form words to say he was sorry. He didn't mean it. He wanted to take it all back.

"Here." The sweet sound caught them off guard again as Eliza walked back into the room, colored paper in hand. She grazed by her mother, brushed by Sam and over to Dean. Her small hand waving the picture in front of him.

"What?" Dean asked, genuinely surprised. "For me?"

She nodded as he took it from her chunky fingers.

"Wow." Dean's eyebrows lifted, his mouth turning up. He was impressed. "Is this me?"

"Yeah." She pointed at the paper. "And that's your brother."

"Well, yeah," Dean commented, "looks just like him." He turned the drawing over so Sam could see. Eliza had drawn Dean with a hunter's cap and jacket on, standing next to a stick-like figure with an enormous, disproportioned head.

Carly giggled. "Go draw another one," she urged the girl out. Funny how a child could walk into a room and make things better for a while.

"Can I play with my toys?"

Carly winked at her. "Of course, baby."

Sam took the picture from his brother. "I look like a candy apple."

Dean stood from the small table. "If I can find where the wolf sleeps, I can get to it a lot easier."

"Maybe it doesn't sleep," the young woman quietly suggested.

Dean and Sam looked over to her. There was a depth in her eyes, a wisdom she held they hadn't noticed before.

"All wolves sleep," Dean casually ventured, testing murky waters.

She smirked, her lips departing from one another in a crooked raise. "Maybe this is a special kind of wolf."

"Mama!" Eliza called again from the other room.

"What is it?"

"I found little hats! And they're shiny!"

The three adults all frowned at one another. Carly turned her body to the side so that everyone in the dinette was witness to little Eliza's show. Before anyone could jump or shout, the child pulled apart the custom made box where John Winchester had stored fifty silver bullets, each with their own velvety spot. The girl opened it with such a thrust of excitement that the slugs dislodged from their upholstery and flew into the air, all finding a brief second to hold on to the atmosphere before gravity pulled them to the floor.

Eliza's eyes tinkled as she watched the shiny objects hit the air, floating frozen. Her pupils dilated and her blue eyes dazzled as she squealed with jubilation, "Forty-eight, Mama!"

The bullets hit the hardwood, bouncing and rolling with clinks and clanks against one another on the boards underneath. Eliza rushed in and started picking them up, followed closely by the adults.

Dean and Sam bent over, gathering up the shiny bullets and placing them back in the black leather box. Eliza pulled her shirt out and scooped up silver pellets one by one.

"Put them in here, darlin'," Dean requested to the young child, showing her how to push the cartridges into their cushioned homes.

Sam glanced up at Carly. "Did she count the bullets in the air?"

The young woman gazed over to him, but her thoughts were far away.

"Is that another one of her things she can do?"

Carly's blues slid over to Eliza. She was gleefully picking up the shiny objects and placing them back into the box, Dean not far from her. They seemed to find the last two.

"Forty-eight." She smiled at Dean, her eyes catching the glimmer of the last pellet as her fingers lingered on the smoothness.

Dean nodded at her. "You like to count?"

Her head bobbed up and down excitedly as Dean's arm lifted in her direction, to give her a gentle pat on the shoulder but the child shied away, shrinking from his hand. She ran around the hunter and back to her mother, hiding her face in the woman's abdomen.

Carly let her body take the hit from her daughter, the child's arms wrapping around her, the silver cross swinging from her neck from the force of the impact. Her face looked down at the young girl and paled. No emotion, no shushing, no comforting. The woman was still with the exception of her head. It was bobbing to the sounds from the iPod.

_Eddie waited til he finished high school_

_He went to Hollywood to get a tattoo…_

"Carly?" Sam tried as he stood upright with help from his brother. Bending down to pick up ammo wasn't exactly what his stitches needed this early in the morning.

Her voice was faint. "Why were there only forty-eight?" Her eyes traveled to the custom box. Two spaces were open, empty areas causing the remaining bullets to be uneven in their symmetrical lines. "You didn't kill the wolf." Her face paled, looking to the older brother. "You missed."

_He met a girl out there with a tattoo, too_

_The future was wide open…_

Dean canted his head. "How do you know that?"

"What happened to the other bullet?"

Dean unconsciously looked to Sam and Carly followed. Sam looked guilt-ridden. The pain was back assaulting his chest. His knees felt like jelly, all soft and mushy. The weight from the shot he chose to take was smothering. He couldn't help it. He wore his heart on his sleeve.

And Carly? Carly read it all.

"What happened?"

_They moved into a place they both could afford_

_He found a night club, he could work at the door…_

Sam swallowed. "There was another wolf…"

"The small one?"

His eyes skimmed over to his brother who was carefully running checklists in his mind of which weapons were on him and where the rest were stashed so he could easily access them.

"Yeah," Sam answered, "it was smaller."

"Mama?" Eliza's precious voice wickedly broke the tension.

Her mother swayed out of her child's grasp, not realizing she was using it for balance. Carly's body started to teeter and her hand came out to catch herself on the wall.

Sam took a step.

_She had a guitar and she taught him some chords_

_The sky was the limit…_

"Did he… have brown eyes?"

Sam stopped.

_Into the great wide open_

_Under them skies of blue…_

"And blonde hair? Almost white?" She twisted her fingers in her own curls.

Sam nodded.

_Out in the great wide open _

_A rebel without a clue…_

Carly's lips broke apart, uneven from one another. She attempted a small smile for the brothers, but failed as two tears slipped out of her pale blue eyes, gliding down her slender cheeks and disappearing down her neck. Her mouth moved in the shape of a name, but it was only for her; she didn't speak it.

Dean looked over to his little brother, his ring tapping the hard plastic of the hilt of his gun. Sam's face, however, was tense and engaged as he followed Carly, watching her heart break and snap. Feeling secrets she carried with her, aching to know the truth of what she wouldn't say.

_His leather jacket had chains that would jingle_

_They both met movie stars, partied and mingled…_

"Mama?" Eliza's arms were wrapping around Carly's legs again and she was squeezing tight.

Her mother wiped at the tears, brushing them lightly away. She blinked down and handed Carly her a book. "Go to the bedroom and look at the pictures. I'll be in soon to read to you."

"I want to go outside."

"Go!" Carly shouted, the sharpness in her voice ringing in the small area.

The brothers automatically jumped at the mother's shrill, but Eliza was unphased. She shook her head in defiance.

Carly closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Her voice was calm and steady when she spoke again. "It's okay, cupcake. I'm just going to talk to our friends for a little bit."

_They A&R man said, "I don't hear a single."_

_The future was wide open…_

The child hesitated but did as she was told. Carly walked her back into the bedroom on the left and the boys listened as she asked for a hug and then to the dozens of kisses she unleashed on her head until a small giggled filtered out.

The door clicked and the woman entered back to the room. The temperature had dropped a few degrees but Sam still felt like he was suffocating.

_Into the great wide open_

_Under them skies of blue…_

Carly walked to the center of the sitting area and took the brothers in again, past seeing them, soaking them into her vision.

Dean was preparing, ready to take her down if he had to. Sam would never have the chance to make a move. His emotions were guiding him now. He was wrecked.

_Out in the great wide open_

_A rebel without a clue_.

Carly turned her body to Sam. She looked beyond him again, seeing something deep inside, something he hadn't seen yet. "You are not alone," she whispered.

Sam swallowed, trying to keep his voice even-keeled. "What?"

"That's what you said to me. In my dream." She blinked. "You are not alone."

Sam's hazels landed on Dean's and they exchanged a careful conversation. Carly interrupted them.

"You're hunters." She gestured to both, her voice lifeless. "Your bags are full of an arsenal of weapons. The unconventional kind for unconventional prey."

She watched Dean shift, his fingers tense. "Yeah."

She picked up one of the mahogany chairs from the dining area and turned it around, sitting quietly. "What did those old men at the barbershop tell you about old Jed Ward?"

Sam and Dean swapped glances, not sure where this was going.

"Uh," Dean answered, "that he was some sort of a legend."

She was humored. "A legend? Not a myth or a fable? I, personally, like to think of him as insane. Brilliant, yes, but maddening."

Sam felt his body weakening. He lowered himself to one of the brown leather chairs.

"Jed inherited this land from his ancestors. The story goes it was cursed soil. Blood spilt here many years before he came along. An apparent _Romeo and Juliet_ of the 1800's took place between his family and another. The guy would have been Jed's uncle, son of a governor, who fell in love with a woman born from a witch. Neither family approved and the lovers hid out here in the woods. Until the boy's father found him and he and the witch came back to convince them to return to their families. They, of course, refused. They were in love. The witch was so infuriated she cast a dark spell over them. It's said she changed the man into a werewolf and the woman into a vampire. Mortal enemies, you see."

Dean let out a gruff, short chuckle. "You don't believe that." He looked at Carly with a hardness in his eyes, an edge to his voice. "A witch? Casting a spell that would turn people into werewolves and vampires?"

"It's just a story. Just like Peter Parker turning into Spiderman from a bite of a hybrid-spider. Who was the first werewolf? And how did it get that way? How was the first vampire born?"

Dean turned away. Everything supernatural was a mystery. All had their own lore, their own stories. And they all seemed to have exceptions. Mutants. Freaks. He looked over to Sam. His brother was staring back. Lots of them had families. Some of them could love.

"I don't know the past, but what I do know what happened here later." Carly stopped talking and waited as the boys set their attention back to her. "Supposedly, the witch had set a loophole in the spell. Every twenty-five years the couple could come back to the woods and see one another for one night in their true form. But they had to spill the blood of eight people, one month per person for the time they lied about their love. If they could force themselves into the role of monsters, they could have one night of being normal." She stopped for a moment, listening to Eliza playing down the hall. Her voice lowered slightly. "So when Jed was a young man, he had the idea that he could build a house and have it blessed to offer to the wolf and the vampire. He carved his own prayer into the door. It would be a peace offering to hopefully undo the deed that his Grandfather had done when he turned the lovers' fate over to the witch. And then Jed waited. But they never showed. Jed grew older, he married and had two children of his own, a son named Sam and a daughter named Carla. Then they grew up. And, still, the curse never rained down. It was a lark. How stupid was he to believe such fabrications?" She settled back in her chair, her fingers fumbling over the cross. The boys waiting for her to get to the number in her head. She reached it and dropped the silver. "Then one summer day, Jed and his wife had the kids home for a weekend getaway. They had a picnic. Their son was twenty-three, their daughter was twenty-eight. She was married and had her own little boy and girl. That night while they slept, the howls started. First from the werewolf. Then from the vampire. Then from the people within the cabin. The wolf came into the bedroom on the right and devoured Sam. The vampire took the other bedroom and slaughtered Jed's wife. But Carla and her family?" Her eyes filled with tears. "Oh, they were cruel to them. The wolf turned the husband and the son into his likeness. The vampire, she changed the mother and her daughter. Once a wonderful family, you see, forced from humans to creatures of the night."

Sam reached up and rubbed his eyes with his fingers, pushing deeply until he saw spots on the back of his lids. He thought about his brother, knowing he was readying himself for a possible attack. Sam glanced towards the sofa. The duffel behind the leather should contain the machete…

"Right after the massacre, Jed took his hunting knife and decapitated both the werewolf and the vampire, bringing the silver blade into their hearts. But his daughter and her family had already began the transformations and they took over the curse set by the old witch. Jed kept the house for them as a sanctuary. It's said they come back every twenty-five years, whether they want to or not, to see one another again." She raised heavy lids to Sam. "You killed Lucas George. He was eight-years-old when he was turned into a werewolf back in 1932." The tears released and glistened her cheeks. She stood up out of the chair, her body pitching for the younger brother. "And he was my son."

**Playlist:** _Here Comes My Girl_ and _Into the Great Wide Open_ performed by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

**A/N:** Thanks for all the reviews. I'm working on the last chapter. I believe it will be six chapters, maybe seven, but I'm thinking six. Thanks again for reading!


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer:** See Chapter One

**Chapter Five: You Don't Know How it Feels**

Carly's body jolted towards Sam, her feet glided across the floor, her hands flexed into fast fists, her face contorted into something he'd seen before. An inhumane emotion he recalled in the monsters he had hunted. When they were hurt. And devastated. And ready to strike. She was solid, but her movements were richly fluid as she approached him in one feathery, deadly dance.

_Damn. Dean was right. I'll never be fast enough._

She was over Sam's body before Dean ever had the chance to breathe his brother's name. Her hands trembled in front of her body as they thrust forward to greet Sam's chest. And then she pushed. Hard.

Her arms recoiled back to her body, she cradled her abdomen and fell to her knees, sobbing. "I'm sorry," she cried. "I'm so sorry."

Dean skidded to a halt at Carly's feet. He glanced up to observe Sam, running a quick visual assessment. His brother stared back at him, his eyes alarmed, but safe.

"Did she hurt you?" Dean grunted.

Sam shook his head. "She… she _pushed_ me."

Carly shoved her slim figure off the floor and walked around the stunned older brother. She moved swiftly into the kitchen and gathered a handful of tissues, dabbing at her face, drying her tears. She kept her back to the men who could, if they chose, kill her at any given moment.

"Carly?" Dean took a few steps her way.

Her body calmed, her arms dropped to her sides.

"Are you saying you're a…" he stopped, feeling a little silly to ask, but he needed her to confirm before he moved to plan B. He felt Sam stand up next to him and he hoped he was there as back-up for Dean, not as a means to talk sense into him. Sometimes the older hunter felt like his relationship with his brother was like a rubber band. They were so close one minute and then life stretched with tension and they couldn't be further apart.

The woman slowly turned around, her eyes wet from the tears, her nose dripping. "A what? A bloodsucker? A tick? A hemo-gobbler? A woman? A mother? A vampire?" She glared at the audacity of these brothers, accusing her of such ugliness. "Eliza and I are. Yes."

"And the big, bad wolf?"

She looked away. "My husband. Henry."

Dean swiveled his neck, getting a good look at Sam. He whipped his hands up into the air and let them fall with a slap to his sides. "So, what? Good monster, bad monster?"

Carly leaned against the counter and tugged on her hair. "No. Same race. We're all monsters. We just took different roads. He became a serial killer and I because a member of society. But, what do you expect? One of us walks on four legs and the other walks on two." She laughed at herself, the giggles starting low and then creeping towards hysteria until the shuddering began. More tears, more gasping.

For a vampire, she certainly had very real emotions, which didn't set well with the older brother. Dean walked to the back of the sofa and brought out the stashed duffel. He placed it on the leather cushion and unzipped the bag.

"What are you saying, Carly? Sam inquired with such a gentleness in his voice. He took a step towards her.

Dean's eyes followed him wary of his intention. Or her reaction.

She looked up at the two, one ready to talk, one ready to cut her head off. And then make his move to the back bedroom…

"I'm saying that we all have choices in this world. We all have a right to live. We all have a right to be treated with respect. As long as we give good and don't take, we all have a right."

She watched Dean's hand bounce off the top of the bag. Watched his eyes watching her. Watching Sam. He cleared his throat. "Even the dead?"

"Even the dead. We've been around a long time. Believe me, the living forever part? It's not so great. Especially when you have a five-year-old you can never leave. And she never gets older. She always needs you. Always."

Sam blinked. "So, you don't feed?" He kept his rhythm, kept his voice kind, kept up a non-threatening appearance.

She shook her head. "No. I did, at first but it was… horrendous." Her blue orbs drifted in remembrance. "And Liza… I just knew there had to be another way."

Sam nodded back to her. "You drink animal blood then?"

Carly twirled her hair tightly around her fingertip. "That. And I work at a blood bank. You'd be surprised how much blood those places end up destroying."

"But Eliza had chocolate milk for breakfast," Dean was looking down, staring back into the bag.

"We still have human cravings. Even if gives us a stomachache afterwards." She shifted her eyes to Dean's duffel. "Please, either take the blade out and get it over with or zip the damn thing back up."

"You're not going to vamp out on us?"

She laughed. "If I wanted to drink your blood, I would have done it last night when you were both passed out on my sofa." She motioned to the canvas again, her voice stern. "Keeping your bag gapped open like that is going to drive me insane."

Dean's hand almost apologetically reached out and pulled the zipper, closing the bag with the machete tucked inside. Tom Petty whispering into his ear not to let it go too far away.

_Let me run with you tonight_

_I'll take you on a moonlight ride…_

"Carly, what about Henry?"

She pushed away from the counter then and walked to the door. She raised herself up on her tiptoes and looked out the peephole. Then it began. She unlocked the door, looked outside, bolted it and tugged on the knob.

_There's someone I used to see_

_But she don't give a damn for me…_

"Henry… and Lucas… have mauled eight people to death every twenty-five years just to have one night of normalcy." She went through the cycle again. "They didn't get off as lucky as Liza and I. They never get to be human or human-like. They're always wolves. Always animals. There is no day and night for them."

_People come, people go_

_Some grow young, some grow cold…_

Sam sighed. "And you come here even though you know they're going to kill eight people?"

They witnessed her run through another irritating round with the door. She'd already lost. The door had kicked her ass days ago. She just couldn't let it go.

_I woke up in between_

_A memory and a dream…_

"They'd kill them anyway. Even if I didn't show up, they'd still want their night. To walk on two legs and sit and eat whatever they wanted. Not what they _had_ to eat. They're not killing eight people for me. They're killing eight people for them."

_My old man was born to rock_

_He's still trying to beat the clock…_

She turned from the old oak and paused, her hands against the cold door and she started to rub.

Dean stepped up to stand next to his brother. "We have to stop them, Carly."

The rubbing continued as her lips moved rapidly and the boys waited her out.

_Think of me what you will_

_I've got a little space to fill…_

"We try to stop each other sometimes. Last time when we were here, we hunted one another, tried to kill the other one. When you love someone and that person has to live a life… that isn't a life, you kind of want to end it for them." She paused a beat. "But the kids… we couldn't kill the kids."

Sam thought back to the clearing. The young wolf on his brother, its jaws snapping near his neck, the sliver popping into its small chest. Then the blonde hair, the light brown eyes, the puckered pink lips. Sam had killed the boy while the supernatural was unable to. He quietly wondered to himself: _What does that say about me?_

Sam's head hung down. "Carly…"

Carly's bare feet barely touched the floor as she waltzed to Sam. "Sometimes, though, death is a better alternative to living like this. Trying to live in a human world when you're… different. Sometimes the fight isn't worth the energy."

_But let me get to the point, let's roll another joint_

_And turn the radio loud, I'm too alone to be proud_

"Eliza does okay with your lifestyle?" Sam looked out from under his bangs. Carly was inches away from him, studying his face, transferring his image from her mind to reality. He squirmed under her hold, the creepy cold drawing him to her with a warm wave underneath.

"Maybe she has been around for seventy-five years, but so much of her is still a five-year-old. Her mind never went beyond that. Still stuck in time. That's why she growled at you. She could smell your blood dripping on the other side of the door."

_You don't know how if feels _

_You don't know how it feels, to be me._

Sam looked away, taking with him the window for her to see within. He felt exposed under her sight, like she was able to see his past and his future. The murder of her son and the killing of creatures even she didn't know existed. And the wrongs and rights he was destined to do. His hazels turned down, refusing her to have access.

"I've seen you before…" she whispered. "It wasn't a dream. It just hasn't happened yet." He wasn't even sure he had heard her correctly, but he ignored it, blocking her from him.

Dean sat down on the leather chair and grabbed for his boots. "So all the food and jugs of water? You didn't use a four wheeler to get here, huh?"

She watched him tie the knots. "I'm not human. I have super powers, remember? I could crush your skull with one blow before you had your other boot on."

He stopped mid-air, his other boot dangling from its shoelace.

"If I wanted to," she concluded.

Dean pushed his foot into the comfort of his worn leather, watching her as she sauntered to him. "Keep your enemies close?" he asked, thinking of the werewolf and the vampire. What a cruel thing to do to people in love.

Carly knelt down and pulled on his laces, evening one bow against the another. "If they're your family, you're screwed."

Dean moved his feet back, standing to tower over the small woman. She gazed at him as well, admiring the way he moved. He challenged her back, offering her nothing. "Suit up, Sam."

Sam blinked, breaking the hazy feeling in his head. He hadn't noticed that he had been a covert onlooker to Carly and Dean as well. She was an amazing sight, when she needed to be, like a beacon in the dark that guided you towards her. Sam's eyes traveled to the wall where she had laid his boots out so perfectly the day before. He attempted to walk at a normal pace to retrieve them.

"What about me and Eliza?" Carly asked cautiously as the room shifted and seem to breathe with excitement from the men.

The boys looked at each other and then back. They understood her question and Sam ventured a joint response, "As long as you keep your nose clean and you don't feed, you won't see us." He started to pull on his boots. "We met a small group of vampires like you a couple of years back."

Carly huffed. "Really? Got their email address? 'Cause the few I've come across have been vicious."

Sam nodded. "Yeah, we've met a couple of those kind, too."

Dean was moving across the room back to their duffels. "You and Eliza hole up in here and we'll come back and let you know when it's over."

Carly's head turned towards the back bedroom. She hadn't heard much from her child in quite a while. "Okay," she agreed.

"Get Eliza and keep her busy inside. Do you really have a cellar here?"

She nodded. "Yes."

"Take her down there if you get nervous." Which sounded like a funny thing to say to a vampire who already needed a high dose of Lorazepam.

Carly started to head to the hallway as her feet slowed to a stop. She looked back to the hunters. "You know, really I'm the one that should be protecting you. He needs two more bodies to kill to come back and still have his one night. Maybe you two should stay here and I could go out and fight Henry…"

"You can fight him, but can you kill him?" Sam's eyes steered over to her.

She stared back at him for a few seconds and then broke the connection quietly, not answering the younger man. Defeated, she walked to the bedroom on the left.

Sam looked over to his brother. "What made you change your mind?"

Dean grabbed his Colt and tucked it under his belt. "About what?"

Sam checked his Glock. "About taking me along?"

Dean lifted his eyebrows, his face softened at the inquiry. "Dude, I'm not going to leave you here with the Addams Family."

Sam smiled. "Oh, _now_ you're not gonna leave me."

Dean nudged him with his elbow. He walked over to the door and waited patiently while Sam shrugged into his jacket. He could hear Carly's feet smacking against the hardwood and the opening and closing of the doors toward the back.

Sam nodded at him that he was ready as Dean twisted the knob, when Carly emerged from the back. She was frantic.

"She – she's gone," Carly stammered, her voice shook from the words.

"What do you mean?" Sam took a step back.

Carly's hands were spread, her fingers working as fast as her mouth. "I mean, she's gone. The – the window was open. She wanted to go out and play and…" her eyes filled with horror, reaching out to the hunters and hitting them in the gut. She was, after all, a mother.

"Would Henry hurt her?" Dean's voice was tranquil and cool.

The young woman tilted her head. "He loves her. He wouldn't want her to suffer anymore." Tears collected behind her lids and she nodded.

Dean swung the door open, the sun shining in from the outside. It felt cool and warm at the same time. Just like Carly. "Come on, Sam."

Sam turned to walk out with his brother when long, icy fingers snaked around his lower arm.

"I'm coming with you."

"Carly…"

"I'm coming." Her stance defying the man. "Believe me, I'm a skilled hunter, too."

Sam caught the gleam of the silver cross and he blinked back, giving in. He couldn't argue with her when her child was God knows where with God knows what. He backed away and let her pass through. She stopped at the doorway, the light from the sun hitting her skin.

"This is gonna hurt." She looked back at Sam. "Do you have that sword-thingy?"

He narrowed his eyes. "We have silver bullets and our shoulder bag…"

"Do you have a blade?"

Sam swallowed. "There's a machete in the duffel."

She looked ahead at Dean waiting for them on the porch. "Bring it." And she stepped into the bright light.

WWW

"Over the mounds." Carly led the way through the mud to the East. Which was good, Dean thought, since the charred remains of little Lucas were Southwest. The brothers shadowed the vampire in tandem, their boots leaving the slippery mud for drying grass. Carly's nose lifted into the air, catching the scents of nature blowing in the wind. She'd turn her head, left then right and choose her direction. She turned and started to lead them straight for the tree lines.

"Are you tracking Henry?" Dean spoke up, not sure if he should. Carly had been quiet, insisting they not yell out for the child. She didn't want to wake the wolf if he taken a rare nap while keeping Eliza captive.

"No," Carly's voice was empty. "Eliza." She inhaled, her small rib cage expanding. "It's just hard for me to do in the sunlight. It deters me. Slows me down. Plus… I can smell Henry out here, too. And he's been _everywhere_." Her hands twined through her hair and she uncharacteristically ruffled the strands frizzy. "It messes with my head."

Sam followed next to Dean, keeping his strides long like his brother. Which really meant that Dean was slowing his pace for him slightly. Sam never had to lengthen his strides on purpose. "So, you can sense them. Can you sense anything else?"

She threw a quick look over her shoulder. "Oh, I sense anything that moves. If I wanted to, I could find a beetle, smell it, and then release it. A week later, put me in an open field and I'll find the same beetle."

Dean lifted his brows to Sam. He whispered, "Superhuman."

"I prefer Super _Woman_," Carly called back. "I have excellent hearing, too."

Sam smiled over to his brother, his cheeks dimpling. "What else?"

She turned around as she walked, keeping her pace as she was now leading them backwards. The shadow of the Evergreens starting to darken their path as they kept moving. "I can move really fast. But when you're tracking someone, that's not a smart thing to do. Everything goes fast." She propelled the hunters into the woods, her body stepping around the first tree, even though her eyes didn't see it standing there. "I can shine a bright light to attract prey. I can change the temperature in a room. I can…" she smiled, "pick up a house and hold it over my head." She flexed her muscles at the boys.

Dean grinned at that. Thoughts ran through his mind and his wide smile gave him away.

Carly's mouth grew bigger. "Oh, yeah, I can do that, too. But only one of us gets any pleasure."

She turned around and took the boys over a ledge of rocks, warning them to watch their step as they made their way down.

"You sense Eliza here?" Sam asked as they neared the bottom.

Carly pointed her nose back into the air and smelled. "She's alive." She smelled again. "She's still a little bit away, though, through those trees over there." She pointed to a gathering of Evergreens on the other side of a stream.

She started to walk over the oddly shaped rocks, leading them all to the stream. Her hands stayed at her sides, her eyes barely looking down. She wasn't going to fall. But the men behind her… well, they were human.

"So you were the light we saw?" Dean asked as he started to lose his balance, his hands flailing from his hips.

"Yes."

Sam was struggling more than his brother, bringing up the rear. The stitches had been pulling for quite some time. A few had popped out. He could feel the slick of blood between his shirt and his abdomen and for a fleeting moment he was curious if Carly could smell it. He was grateful he had the jacket on to cover the gray t-shirt. Dean would have had him sitting on a rock, waiting for them to come back for him. He slipped once and his left foot landed in the water.

Carly stopped. "You okay?"

Sam nodded. "Yeah." He met Dean's eyes and nodded again, waving at them to keep the pace. "So," he needed to keep ears off his splashing, "you saved us?"

The vampire laughed. It was sweet and colorful. "Oh, I don't know. I like to think of it as I caused a diversion. I think you probably saved each other." She said it as such an after-thought that the words didn't actually hurt either men as they listened.

"Your sense of smell is heightened," Sam continued. "your hearing… that's it?"

She shrugged a shoulder as the rocks had given away to the water and her feet dipped into the cold stream. "I can't walk on water," she joked. "I see things. I read people. I sense things in their lives that are going to happen."

"Like ESP?" Dean chimed in, his boots sloshing through the small river now.

Carly walked on, hurrying her way through the wetness. It wasn't deep. At most, it hit them mid-calf. "Not really. I mean, I can sense how a person is feeling and maybe what they are thinking in the moment, but the only thing I really _see_ is their death." She reached the other side of the bank and stepped back to the short drying grass. She shook her feet violently and ultra-fast. When she stopped, the water was evaporated. There was no sign of her being even a little bit damp.

The Winchesters each slugged up the side of the river, pulling their wet boots and soggy jean bottoms with them. They stopped next to each other and caught their breaths for a moment. Carly was sniffing at the air.

"You see how people are going die?" Dean asked, his eyes looking at the fair woman.

She opened her eyes to him and her cheek quirked up. "Yeah." She held out her finger, signaling them to let her finish. "And, no, I can't use it on myself. It only works with humans. Not vampires." She waved dismissively at them. "Or things on that are non-human."

Sam's chest heaved a few times and he blinked at her, wondering. "Can you see mine?"

She looked at him. "Yes." And then her cheek fell, her face sobering. "But you already know how that fairytale ended."

Sam opened his mouth and then let it click shut. Maybe she only saw one death. Maybe Sam was like her now. He had died, came back unnaturally. Maybe he wasn't…

"Stop worrying." Carly's voice interrupted his thoughts.

God, the stitches were pulling at his chest. His heart was racing his blood through his veins. The vampire was looking at him like he was delicious. She shook her head at him and answered, "You can't change who you are. You can only change the road you're on."

Sam's brows bunched over the bridge of his nose.

Then she smiled. "And for what it's worth, no one should be stabbed in the back."

Sam looked away. She saw too much, she said too much, she made him feel too much. He felt his brother near him and his breath evened out, he felt relieved. He was getting so tired of walking through the woods with so much weighing on his mind. And then, to make things a little heavier, Dean spoke up.

"And mine?" His was soft and ambivalent, wanting to know, but not wanting to know.

Sam's heart skipped a beat. He couldn't breathe.

Carly's eyes drifted over to the older man. She nodded.

His head ticked to the side, his right hand splayed next to his chest. "Is it…" he stopped for a few seconds and then before he changed his mind, "is it bad?"

She shook her head, but kept her eyes locked on Dean. She swallowed. "No, it's not bad. It's awful."

Dean felt the rapid flutter of his lashes on his cheeks. Felt the heat wave through him and leave his body. Felt himself grow woozy with the sinking of her voice. He was drowning in fire and there was no escape. No one could save him from the pit.

Sam's hand clapped on his shoulder and Dean opened his eyes, suddenly realizing that he had shut them. "Dean?"

Dean licked his lips, shaking his head back to the forest. Back to the reality of being stuck in the woods with his brother and their camp scout, the vampire. His timeline was coming to an end. He tossed his head up and down - for Sam's sake - giving him an "I'm okay" look and tore away from his clasped hand.

Carly's body became rigid, her head whipped in the opposite direction, and she inhaled deeply. "Over here." She started to climb up the small hill leading away from the stream, the brothers tagging behind her. The Evergreens were everywhere now, their height casting dark shade towards the Earth, mixing with other shadows, cooling the air and chilling the skin of the men.

"Eliza never goes this far out."

"She does this often?" Sam asked, his calves pushing with force to keep up.

"Liza puts the term hide-and-seek to new levels," Carly shouted back. She slowed up a little, letting Sam catch up to her and Dean. She turned her nose up and smelled, being sure to let Dean think the slower pace was because of Carly and not because of his brother. She turned to the right and pointed. "This way."

Dean followed, catching his brother's sluggish movements behind him. "You okay?"

Sam nodded, his breath uneven. The strap from the machete was tearing into his chest now, the machete itself was banging lightly against his back.

Dean waited for him and took up his pace beside him. His eyes slid over as they started up the hill after Carly. "Sam…"

"I'm fine, Dean." His lips pierced tightly together.

"But…"

"Dean." Sam took in a shaky breath. "Not now."

Dean continued to climb, his legs spacing farther apart until he was ahead of his brother again, not next to. He pushed easily with his legs, knowing he could shove by both Sam _and_ Carly, if he really wanted to. But he didn't. He moved ahead, but kept close enough to hear his brother. Just in case.

"_Well I won't back down,"_ Carly's voice drifted down to the boys, _"No, I won't back down. You can stand me up at the gates of hell, but I won't back down."_

Dean frowned. _What is it with her and Tom Petty?_ He wanted to ask, but her voice was impeccable and he found himself humming with her.

"_No, I'll stand my ground, won't get turned around. And I'll keep this world from draggin' me down. Gonna stand my ground…"_

"_And I won't back down,"_ Dean heard Sam chime in.

Dean smiled and joined in the chorus_. "Hey, baby, there ain't no easy way out and I won't back down."_

Carly suddenly stopped, her right arm extending out, her elbow locking. She turned her head slightly to the right and listened. Dean and Sam stalled behind her, taking note the noises around them. Whatever it was she heard, the Winchesters were unable to pick up the sound wave.

Her feet started moving. Dean raced up the small hill they were on after her, Sam trailing behind, his left arm cradling his middle. She moved stealthily, crafting her body around the forest. There was no way possible for either brother to keep up with her. So they followed the best they could, letting their eyes travel the distance with her, watching as her red shirt blurred in and out of the trees. Dean stopped and waited for Sam once, searching into the distance as his younger brother hiked up another minor hill. They jumped a smaller stream of water and then came across a scattering of trees. They appeared to have fallen – or been knocked down – onto one another. Tree after tree laid on the ground, with huge branches of Evergreens next to it laying on top. Getting through the mess took time and energy.

Sam cursed his handicap as Dean yelled, "There she is!" and sped away to help. Sam wondered which "she" Dean was talking about. He trudged on, up and down, until he met up with him.

Carly stood towards the center of where the trees had fallen, searching with her hands, letting her senses guide her. She easily moved rocks and large branches, keeping her body bent low.

"Eliza!" She hollered out. Her nose dipped towards the air above and she inhaled. "Do you smell that?"

"Yes," the brothers answered in unison. It was fermenting the air. The scent of thick, decaying, rotten fruit. Dean remembered it from when he went to burn the boy – the wolf. He remembered how Carly smelled sweetly of lemons. He wondered if Eliza had, too, but he just hadn't had enough time to spend with her. Maybe they all smelled sweet until…

"Something's wrong," Carly was saying, her hands shoving a tree trunk to the side. She stopped and picked up the area around it, her fingers moving fast until there was no grass or weeds. Just mud. "Something's wrong," she repeated.

The boys watched her in awe for a few seconds. She'd move a rock and have to clean the area under it. She'd smell the air and turn her head each way. She'd call for her daughter and wait. When no response came, she'd mutter, "Something's wrong" and she'd repeat her actions. She also did the routine with extraordinary speed and beauty.

The young woman picked up a large boulder and moved it to see what was on the other side. Nothing. She started to back away when her hands stopped and picked at the grass the rock had been resting on until there was just mud. Dean wondered about the dirt mounds and the mud surrounding the cabin. They were a curious sight when he and his brother had stumbled upon them. Now, it was all starting to come together. Dean turned and started to look to the left. Sam took the right.

"Something's wrong."

Sam stopped and looked over to Carly. "What? What's wrong?"

She looked up. "I can smell her. With that… smell. And she's not calling back to me."

Sam wasn't sure what to say to her and she was staring at him, her hope depleting. Needing to know. Needing to find her child. He bent down, with the tug on his sides and started looking in between fallen trees. All three adults searched the area for the small girl, looking for any signs that she was okay, looking for a sign that she was lost or, God forbid, kidnapped by the werewolf.

It was Carly, though, who found her daughter.

Her little legs were sticking out of a group of fallen trees. Carly had removed part of a group of branches when she saw her. The mother's scream was deafening, caught in the large Evergreens still growing above. The leaves rumbled in response, birds dispersed into the sky, animals scurried to take cover, and Winchesters covered their ears. It was painful to all things living.

Carly sank to the ground. Her knobby knees hitting with such force the Earth cracked under her pressure. She pushed a large trunk off the young girl and sat back, staring at what was left.

Sam wasn't far from the body at all and soon his boots chomped the grass next to her, his hands pressing towards her, wanting to reach out, but knowing it would cross an imaginary, unspoken line. He eyed Dean across the patchwork of mud and grass and shook his head in sympathy.

It was difficult to tell if it had been quick or not. The child's head wasn't attached to her small body any longer. Even for a young vampire, the heart hoped she had been knocked out before the werewolf had decapitated her.

Carly's hands clung to her baby's calves and slid down to her shoes. Her fingers flying over the laces, untying them and removing each one from her tiny feet. She took the shoes and clutched them to her chest, her body rocking in a silent lullaby.

"I'm so sorry, Carly."

The words shook her and her shoulders jerked. Her hands fell to her lap and her head shot up. Eyes bloodshot, wide and insane, cheekbones defined under facial muscles hidden before, lips beet red, swollen and pulsating. And the teeth. A gorgeous set of full, porcelain white, carnivorous teeth. Sharp and deadly. She roared at the younger brother.

The machete was strapped securely to Sam's back, within reach, just as the vampire had requested before leaving the cabin. But Sam didn't reach for it. He didn't back up. He didn't even flinch. It was now that he reached out and placed his hand on Carly's shoulder.

And Dean started running.

"Sam!"

Sam looked over Carly's shoulder in time to see his older brother barreling for him. The vampire turned with the younger man, staring at the hunter as he plowed his way to them. Carly's eyes went wide at what she saw and what she read. Dean's face pensive, a determination held in his eyes, repeating to himself: _Not my brother. Not again. I won't lose you again._

Carly stood with Sam, as his hands flew up, readying for the hit from Dean. She started to speak, started to place her own hands up in defense. If she could just get him to slow down and _see_.

The flash took them all by surprise. The white wolf entered from the left, his paws spread, spanning the size of a man's chest. He leapt out of the trees, saliva dripping and smashed himself into Dean's side.

Carly let out a wheezy gasp as her husband's animal form pounced onto the stranger. Dean's gaze held tight with the vampire as her sight soaked him in. He spoke one thought to her, to himself, to the world.

_Save Sam. _

**Playlist:** _I Won't Back Down_ performed by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, sung by Carly George, background vocals from Dean and Sam Winchester

**A/N:** Hey, thanks for the reviews. Seriously? They make me smile. And then grin. One more chapter to go! I'll have it up in a couple of days. Thanks so much for reading.


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer:** See Chapter One

**Chapter Six: Even the Losers**

Dean rolled with the large wolf across the thorny ground. The animal held power beyond the hunter's personal limits. His muscles flexed and stretched as he pushed, thwarting the animal away.

The werewolf snapped, hungry for the hunter's throat, only to have Dean belt it across the jaw, sending it hurtling over its shoulders, its head whipping in the opposite direction. Dean scrambled out underneath it, his body turning to stand when the wolf jumped again, this time striking the man with its large claws, raging down his back. Dean fell forward with the force, his head bashing against a fallen tree.

He could hear the distant commotion around him. He heard his name being called. He heard the click of Sam's Glock. And he heard the unmistaken sound of the bullet being fired.

Sam brought the gun down, staring at the wolf as it reared back. The shot had got it in the lower flank. Only enough to sting, let it feel the cool burn of the silver but not even close to killing it.

It did, however, distract the animal from taking a fleshy bite out of Sam's brother. And for the moment, that was good enough.

The wolf turned its head and stalked in front of the fallen man, dangerously studying the one standing, with the gun. It glared into Sam's eyes. It should have finished him off when it had the chance. Shouldn't have played the game at hand. It was the monster and had a reputation to hold up to.

Sam watched as the white wolf snarled its teeth, stained with blood of past kills. Blood of its children. Its head hung low, but its eyes held high. It took a tight step forward, keeping its chest towards the ground. No use in giving the human hope that he could still out wit the beast.

Dean stirred behind the animal, his body slowly turning from the tree trunk. He opened small slits of green just in time to see Sam raising his gun out from his body and the wolf taking three long strides to greet him.

"Sam…" it came out weak, like he felt. Lost in the air, fate showing a full house. Sell us your soul but we'll still get your brother in the end. Or worse. Let him be changed into something you'll have to hunt during your final days.

Then he saw the glow. The wolf stilled. The trees stopped moving. The air thickened, dense fog floated by, making it hard to breathe.

Dean's head lifted part way. His ears were ringing and he had to squint through his hazels to block out the stars swimming in his vision. Sam was in front of the wolf, gun pointed across his center, but in between them was… light.

And light was Carly.

Her right bare foot stepped back as her body crouched forward. Her arms separated from her sides and she watched the wolf shift towards her. Its breath hit the air in sour-tangy pants, wheezing through its lungs in a low rattle. Dark-skinned lips curled over its teeth and they started an obsessive twitch.

"You ready?" She asked the werewolf coolly.

Its head dipped up and down in response.

Sam took a step forward, thinking for a brief moment of insanity, that maybe he should end this fight before it started. He stalked up behind Carly as she flipped her hand in his direction, pushing him easily to the ground with a thud.

"Hunter, stay."

Sam blinked back. He watched as the shine Carly was emitting began to fade as she and the wolf leapt for one another at the same time. Their bodies met in mid-air, one crashing into the other, spinning circles around the brothers' heads, dizzying the humans. The boys stole a glance at one another as they became onlookers in a battle caught between two worlds.

Henry's razor-like claws gashed and tore shreds down Carly's body. Her white flesh peeled back like rubber, exposing china-bone underneath, but barely a drop of blood. The wolf shoved her, ramming its body against hers. It threw her into the tall Evergreens and then rushed her back to the ground. Its jaws opened and wrapped around her lower arm and then it clenched down, its top teeth overlapping the bottom as it pressed.

Carly took the beating. Let the werewolf work out its rage for her. Let it feel her body unraveling at its hands. Let it touch her one last time.

God, she loved him.

The spinning slowed and their bodies lowered again, Carly's feet barely touching the dirt as she danced with her husband on the forest floor. They stopped and gazed into each other's eyes. Behind the fur, the paws, the cold, and the anger… there was still some humanity there. Somewhere deep inside.

The wolf's body leered once, its mouth opened and it wrapped its mighty jaws around the vampire's neck. It started to squeeze. And that was its fatal mistake.

Carly reached her left hand up and grabbed Henry's bottom jaw and then her right settled over its top. She held fast and gripped them both tightly, pulling back in one explosive thrust, snapping the wolf's maw in half.

It retracted back with a high squeal, a yelp that sounded more like an abused dog than a ferocious beast. It took a clumsy step back in the woods, the vampire following with certainty. It had, after all, played out in her hands the way she had imagined it would go down. The way she had dreamt it would so long ago.

Her hands trembled once as they reached for her love. She grabbed its head and twisted it violently to both sides, feeling the bony skull rock and roll between her palms. She felt the snap, heard the pop and started to lift the animal up from the ground, its shoulders unable to take the weight and friction of the pulling until the tearing began. Carly twisted the wolf's head around, her eyes catching the blood trickle from the neck as it ripped apart until the entire head came off in her hands in one great suction cup sound.

Henry's animal eyes closed, the pinkish-black tongue protruded out. Blood poured from its animal body, spilling all over the dirt. All over Carly.

She turned to Sam. "Shoot him. Shoot him in the heart."

Sam grimaced. The last time he had shot a werewolf, it hadn't gone very well. In fact, the time before that? He wasn't hot on re-living that one, either.

_No more werewolves._

Sam raised his Glock and pointed at the wolf's torso. He narrowed his eyes and took the shot. The silver burned out of the chamber smacking through the thick coat and into its chest. Only then did its knees buckle and the creature fell, its fur floating away from its body as the wind kicked back up.

Carly's eyes constricted as she observed the gentle transformation from the wolf to her husband. Her eyes softened, her red lips turned to pink and her smile contained only one set of teeth. Her smile, of course, through her tears, genuinely falling down her cheeks. She stared into Henry's face, her hands still holding his detached head and she kissed his lips.

"Henry."

She fell near his torso, the Earth once again taking the assault as she rejoined his head with his body. She lovingly brushed his hair out of his eyes and started singing. _"Well, I started out down a dirty road, started out all alone. And the sun went down as I crossed the hill, and the town lit up, the world got still."_

Sam walked to his brother and reached his arm down, Dean taking it with great appreciation. The younger man pulled back as he helped the injured man back up.

"You okay?" Sam's voice was masking the emotion he was trying to fight.

Dean gave him a quick nod. He reached over with his hand to feel his back. The wolf's claws had ripped through his coat, into his shirt and had made purchase with his flesh. The heat shot up his spine, burning his neck. "Son of a bitch," Dean murmured as blood appeared on the palm of this hand.

Sam did a quick once over on his brother. "Coat took most of the damage," he announced. The cuts were angry, but they weren't as deep as Sam had originally feared.

Dean scowled. "I know. Thank God I didn't wear my leather."

Sam canted his head. Leave it to his brother to be more concerned with a jacket than his own life.

"How's she doing?"

They both turned to look over to the vampire. Her head was moving from one lifeless body to the other. Her heart, if it was able to beat, would certainly be bleeding itself to death.

Dean pushed off the fallen trees he was using as a crutch and brushed by Sam. The younger brother following close behind. They walked over to the woman's small figure and lingered above her. The tears were unstoppable. Her grief was inconsolable.

"Carly…" Sam began.

She shook her head. Too soon. Not ready. Even for the reborn dead.

Sam tugged on his brother's shredded jacket and they walked away from the vampire. They stood together for some time, shoulder to shoulder, waiting her out, listening to her serenade Tom Petty to the ones she loved. Dean thinking about the salt and burn of the bodies, Sam thinking about the salt and burn of the lives lost by the dark side of the supernatural.

The soft crunching of sticks brought their head up as Carly made her way to them. She walked without victory, her bare feet unscathed from the Earth. Her shoulders were sunken, the distant look returning to her eyes. She had no light to possess any longer.

"Carly, we're so sorry." Sam's voice was sincere and her cheek ticked up in response.

She caught his eyes and held him for a moment. "It's not your fault. You hunt evil." She reached a cold hand out and grazed Sam's cheek with the back of her fingers. "We all have choices to make and they were wrong. I don't blame you for Lucas."

Sam's breath hitched and he leaned his face towards her fingers but she removed them before he gained any comfort.

She took a step back. "Almost done."

Dean cleared his throat. "Yeah. If you want to go back to the cabin, Sam and I will burn the…" he stopped himself, his eyes drifted. "You don't want to be here for this, Carly."

She took another step back, spreading her arms apart. "I can't leave." She thumbed over her shoulder. "Look."

The boys looked in the way she was motioning and saw standing in the middle of the fallen trees was a mighty Evergreen, hollowed out in the middle. Dean's eyes narrowed. Sam gasped.

"You know it." Carly stared at the younger brother, not asking a question, but making an observation.

Dean's head swiveled in Sam's direction.

"I… uh, saw it my dream this morning."

She smiled a little. "Yeah. Me, too." Silence hung like a blanket over them. Along with the coming dark.

Dean waited and then, "What?"

Carly moved to the tree, looking around the trunk, checking the ground until she found the spot that was calling to her. She looked up and waved the Winchesters over.

The vampire was anxiously preparing. She pulled some stray grass off the area and moved two rocks. She glanced up to Sam. "You have to kill me." It was said with such a casual and excited tone, the hunter thought at first she was possibly joking.

Sam let out a small laugh and exchanged a look with Dean. "No."

Carly stopped moving and stared back at him, incredulous. "Yes. This is it. I've seen you in my dreams for _years_. This tree." She turned around and patted the bark. "Right here. And you. This is how I die."

"I thought you couldn't see your own death," Dean pointed out.

Carly shrugged. "I didn't. Not like I see… other people's deaths. I always thought it was just a crazy dream."

"Carly, I'm not going to kill you. I can't kill something unless… it's evil."

She stopped. "But I am."

Sam lifted his brows. "Well, you're not… natural, but…" Sam looked to Dean for a little help. "But you're not evil."

Her eyes hardened and the boys felt the icy shift against their skin. "I'm a monster. And I swear," her fingers came up to her neck and she caressed the glossy silver, "I swear to God if you don't kill me now, I will hunt tonight. And I will kill until you have to come after me." She glowered at both brothers. "Do you really want that blood on your hands?"

She was talking crazy. She was talking like a woman who had just lost everyone she loved. She was talking like a human.

"I don't believe you, Carly," Sam stated. "You said it yourself. We all have choices. We all have the right to live."

Carly's hair fluttered in the wind. Her eyes shut and when they opened again, they were bloodshot, her lips filling with red, new teeth descending over the first set. "I have **nothing**!" She shouted, the last word ricocheting off the Evergreens. "I have nothing to _live_ for! This is _what_ I am!" Her voice lowered to a manageable level, her attention turned to Dean. "I hope there is a God so he can forgive me for what I've done, but I'd rather go to hell then live a day alone in this world."

The silence engulfed the three of them again. Carly slowly lowered herself to her knees. She looked up. "Get it over with."

The machete was pressing into Sam's back. The strap was pulling across his chest, plucking at stitches ready to give. It was so heavy. He reached back and brought it across his middle, staring at the blade's edge. "I can't. I don't believe…"

"I'll take your brother. I swear I will. Tonight. Tomorrow. I'll get him."

Sam stopped. She was pulling at straws. Desperate. Sam pushed his lips out. "You're lying."

"Isn't it just like a woman? Never knowing if you can believe them or not?" Carly smirked. She shook her head and opened her mouth, her sing-song voice hitting the air crisply. _"Oh, you were a vampire and, baby, I'm the walking dead… Oh, you were a vampire and now I'm nothing at all."_

Dean looked down. "Now, she changes her tune," he muttered under her breath.

"You're not a monster," Sam whispered. His eyes were hot, to her cold, he was resolute, to her pleading.

Carly took in a long breath, reading him. "Oh." She smiled to herself as though she just got the punch-line of a really lame joke. "I think the wrong brother has the sword."

Sam's head slowly turned to Dean. His brother's chin already pointing in his direction.

"We all have a purpose in life," Carly repeated herself. "My purpose is gone and I swear to you I will become what I was designed to be." She laid her eyes on Dean.

The older Winchester's hand stretched across the younger and he gently pulled the machete out of Sam's weak hold.

"Get behind me," the vampire instructed.

Dean gulped and followed the darkening grass up the slope to where Carly knelt, her back to him.

Sam turned away.

"Wait." Carly's voice halted him and forced him to look back. "You stand there and you talk to me."

Sam's hands came out and smacked his sides. "What?" his voice was an octave higher than he planned. "What am I suppose to say?"

"It's okay." She was calm and collected. "You say it's okay and you're not alone."

Sam stared at her. The vampire's eyes were still bloodshot, her face was paling even more against the turning sky. Sam blinked back the wetness he felt building in his eyes and nodded.

"It's okay," Carly reminded him. He wasn't sure if she said it for her benefit or his.

Sam saw Dean's legs spread apart behind her and he shifted his weight from one foot to the other. The younger man cleared his throat and looked at Carly. She stared back up, her eyes locked with his, urging him, encouraging him.

"It's okay," Sam's voice broke and cracked, unrecognizable to himself. His periphery caught Dean's arms bending at the elbow and swaying to the right, the falling sun glistening off the blade. "You did the best you could." Sam saw Dean's eyes focus. He had his mark. His body stopped moving and his shoulders pulled back. He waited for Sam.

Carly's eyes softened. Her lips turned to pink. Tears brimmed on the edge of her lids as she held Sam's gaze. "Don't hold it against him," she suddenly blurted out. "He just couldn't live without you."

The world was starting to tank from Sam's point of view. The sky was getting so dark and the air was growing so cold. He wanted to tell her to wait. Wait until the sun came up again. Tomorrow would be a better day.

"Thank-you, hunters," she murmured.

Sam nodded to her. "I'm here, Carly." He took in a deep breath. "You are not alone."

Dean finished out with the swing, his body following through, the blade slicing easily into the vampire's head. It sounded like a picnic watermelon being cracked open.

Blonde locks toppled one another as Carly's head flipped and flopped to the ground below.

They turned from the scene simultaneously, Dean dropping the machete from his hands. He spun on his heels, facing the hollowed out tree, the palms of his hands slamming into his eye sockets. He pressed down deep until stars and stripes blared back to him. His mind raced back to the day before. _The day before_ and Sam, staring at the wolf-boy's body, trembling, crying that he had killed a child. Suddenly, Dean kind of knew what he felt like. Killing the mother wasn't any easier.

"FUCK!"

Sam twirled the opposite way, swaying twice when his eyes traveled to the Evergreens fallen in front of him. He thought of Henry to his left and little Eliza laying not far from him. Father and daughter, werewolf and vampire. Born from love, died mythical enemies. Their souls long sold and forgotten by everyone. His breath caught somewhere in his throat, driving his knees to the muddy floor below. The forest was turning blue and black, coming alive with the sounds of the night critters, the insects, strange birds calling from above. Sensory overload for one night.

The dry heaves started.

Dean heard his brother trying to empty his toast onto the dirty ground. Heard his knees crack as his body landed into the mud. Heard the sigh escape his lips. Heard his heart fall apart inside his chest. Dean's boots clumped against the short grass as he walked around Carly's body to get to his purpose in life. The road he had chosen.

He stooped down in front of his younger sibling. His calloused hands reached out and grabbed a sleeve of Sam's coat. He yanked on it forcefully, drawing Sam's eyes up. "Sam?"

Dry eyes filled with sorrow, haunted by fear stared back and Dean felt something inside of him twist in response. "Why'd you do it?" Sam's voice was so low, so soft, Dean had to lean in to catch the words.

"What?" His face frowned. "Sam, she begged us. You heard her, she…"

"Why'd you make the deal?"

_Oh_. Dean closed his mouth. Silly hunter. Here Dean had thought the lesson had been with the vampire. The joke was on him.

"Why didn't you just let me stay dead?"

"What? I told you…" Dean's orbs were swimming, tears threatening to fall over.

"You were free."

"Free?"

Sam's eyes were hot and dry which was really funny to Dean because he could feel the wetness running down his own cheeks now.

"You didn't have to choose anymore. You didn't have to save me. You didn't have to kill me. It was already decided. You didn't have to do anything."

Dean swallowed. He felt his body sway and his grip on Sam's sleeve tightened, keeping him from tumbling over. "I had to let you go, Sam."

"Yeah. That was it."

"That was…?" Dean stopped, taking in a shaky breath. He released his air. "Couldn't do that. Couldn't let you _go_. I have to _save_ you."

Sam shook his head. "It wasn't about Dad or the promise or saving me. It was about you, Dean. You couldn't be alone."

Dean blinked and another tear trailed down his face. _Shut up, Sam._

"So now you're leaving me. And I have to live without you. Without anybody."

Dean's eyes fell. _Shut up, Sam._

"What can you possibly say to make that all right?"

The words Dean had spoke to his brother regurgitated back to him onto his lap. It was a sticky mess. He felt the tears turn to anger and the anger turn to rage. "What, Sam? What do you want me to say?"

"I don't know… how about you're sorry?"

"Sorry?"

"Yeah."

"Sorry?"

Sam glared at him.

"No."

Sam nodded, his blood fuming as he turned away.

"What about you?"

He looked back. "What about me?"

"I sold my soul for you, Sam. And I don't even get a thank-you?"

"Give me a break."

"I'm serious. You want an apology, fine. I want a thank-you."

"I never asked you…"

"That's right. You never asked me."

Sam pulled his arm from Dean's grasp and pushed away, leaving Dean's body to fall backwards to his legs behind him, sitting with his soul slaughtered on God's green Earth. Sam had the salt can and was spreading white over Carly's remains. He walked to Henry and on to Eliza. Then he reached for the lighter fluid and Dean listened to the gulping liquid as it splashed over the family.

Sam's hand was suddenly in his line of vision. He looked up to his brother, secretly grateful he'd come back to help him. "You got the lighter," Sam reminded him tersely.

Dean's hands almost couldn't find the pocket of his jacket as his fingers fumbled for his Zippo. Sam grabbed it from him and lit the bodies, the woods shining in the fiery light. Shadows played on one another. Tempers cooled, hearts chilled.

Sam looked in Dean's direction. "Come on."

Sometimes the little brother's job required picking up the pieces, too.

They walked back through the forest of trees in silence. They crossed the clearing where Lucas's body lay in a mound of charred ash without speaking. Night fell over them as they reached the cabin, walking in, back to one another. Neither made eye contact. It was another day almost gone.

For that reason alone, they hurt. Both of them.

Sam threw the duffel down to the floor. The cabin hadn't changed, but it felt darker. It felt empty. It smelled musty and old without the sweet scents of the vampires masking it.

_It don't really matter to me, baby, _

_You don't believe what you want to believe, _

_You don't have to live like a refugee…_

Dean marched by Sam and grabbed the iPod in his hands, shaking it violently. Tom kept playing, despite his efforts. "How do you… change the fu –"

Sam reached over and took the music device from his brother. His long fingers glided around the face, pushing the dial a couple of times until a different song came on. He gave Dean a small smile and placed it back on its charger. The gentle music filled the void.

_You can take all the tea in China_

_Put it in a big brown bag for me…_

Then he swept by Dean and walked to the hallway, where a dim light was coming from the back bedroom on the left. The door was propped open from Carly's jaunt through the house earlier that day. Sam walked slowly down the short corridor, Dean on his heels, both holding their breath as they approached the room. Part of each of them felt like they were trespassing. Part of each of them thought they may actually find the vampires in the room, alive and giggling.

Sam pushed at the half-open door until both men were both able to peer inside. There was the brown leather chair, shoved into the corner, the side table next to it and the old phonograph, polished, looking like new. And a full sized bed decorated in a white comforter with pink polka dots. The bed frame shot up in a mahogany canopy with a white princess toile hanging down. There were at least a dozen pillows of different shapes and sizes laid at the top.

_She's as sweet as tupelo honey_

_She's an angel of the first degree…_

Sam felt Dean sigh against the back of his neck as he mumbled, "Superhuman strength. Superhuman speed."

There was a picture on the made-up bed, the drawing Eliza was working on before she escaped out her window. Or was lured out. Some things would still remain a mystery.

Sam walked over and picked it up. It was a drawing of her family, all labeled with their names. Her mom and herself, beautiful blonde hair in pretty gowns and her dad and Luke. They looked like happy dogs, wagging their tails. Not like wolves or things she should be afraid of. It was always the predator who disguised himself the best to the prey.

Sam tossed it back on the bed and headed out of the room. His stitches were itching him and he really needed to sit down.

_You can't stop us on the road to freedom_

_You can't stop us 'cause our eyes can see…_

The living area seemed so much smaller. Dean walked by and picked up the black coffee mug and retreated to the kitchen. He pushed the 'on' button of Carly's coffee machine. It started percolating. He could hear Sam pulling out the sofa bed and he turned around to say something, but he already had it out. And, really, what could he say? Sam had a point. Dean had sold his soul to bring Sam back from the dead but that didn't mean he was saved. It didn't mean Sam was pure.

_Just how sure are you what you brought back is one hundred percent pure Sam?_

"Want a cup?" Dean held the mug up into the air.

His brother was just sitting down on the side of the bed. He glanced up at the black coffee cup and abruptly shook his head. Dean poured the caffeine mixture in and walked back to the living room. He sat down on the brown leather chair of Sam's dreams and looked around.

_Men with insight, men in granite_

_Knights in armor bent on chivalry… _

Dean reached above his shoulder and grabbed the wooden candlestick down from the bookcase. He rolled it in his right hand and took a long look at it. It was a keepsake wedding candlestick, engraved with the marriage of Henry and Carla George. Dated 1929. He held it up for Sam to see.

There are times that with being human, people have a way of seeing others without _seeing_ them. Talking to them without _speaking_ to them. Hearing them without _listening _to them. It happens in all relationships. Lovers. Parents. Children. Siblings. Not everyone is supernatural. Or even superhuman. Most people? Are just normal.

Dean suddenly saw his brother. And his brother was staring at him like he had seen a ghost.

"Sam?"

_Shut up, Dean._

Sam watched his brother drop the candlestick, put the coffee mug on the side table and raise from the brown leather. The room tilted on its end for a moment and then evened itself out. Sam tried to ignore him as Dean walked the short distance to where he sat. Dean's body slanted to the left as he made his way to him as Sam blinked hard, trying to still his world. He opened his eyes back up and saw his brother in front of him, resting on his hind haunches, reaching for Sam's jacket. His lips were moving.

"…don't look so good… take this off…"

_You know she's alright_

_You know she's alright with me…_

Sam allowed himself to be removed from his coat.

"Sam?"

A lump had wedged in Sam's throat and he had swallowed numerous times already. It was stuck. "Why is okay with you that everyone can die but me?"

Dean sighed, blinking at him. The kid just couldn't let it go. He had to blame somebody. If it wasn't Dean, he'd settle on himself if he had to. "Is that what you think?"

Sam shrugged. "You'll kill anything, even yourself, just to keep me alive."

"You're my little brother," Dean whispered. "You're my family."

Sam ticked his head. "And you're mine. I'm not worth _more_ than you, Dean. You're just as important to me…"

"I know, Sam."

Sam shut his eyes again, his head hanging low. When did it become so complicated? When did he lose so much? Why was it this? His brother trading his life for Sam's seemed to make everything else that had happened seem so less important.

Maybe because when he lost Jess, when he lost Dad… he still had Dean. God, he missed his brother already. He hated him for what he had did. And he couldn't love him more, either. He wished things could be easier, wished it could go back to when Dean would nudge him and call him Sammy.

"Sammy…"

Then again. Sam's eyes snapped up.

Dean's fingers wrapped around his brother's biceps. "I did it because I couldn't bury you. I couldn't burn you. I did it because all I knew was that I had to save you. If it's the last thing I do, I'm gonna save you."

_She's as sweet as tupelo honey_

_She's an angel of the first degree_

Dean blurred against the dark background of the cabin as Sam's eyes filled. Strange how things work out. Two years ago Sam was planning on going to law school. He was going to have a fiancé and later a wife. Hell, by this time, he should have been married and choosing which law firm to join. Shopping for a house and maybe a crib. Certainly not hunting monsters. And killing them because of something they _might_ do in the future.

Just like him. What would have happened to his white-picket life when the black was spilled out? Sooner or later, the demons would have come. The truth would still be told. How would Jess have handled it? Would she stay by his side like his brother? Would she have had the strength to fight? Would she find a way to get to know him as he changed? Would she have loved him through it all?

_You almost died in there. What would I have…_

In all honesty, it had always been his brother. Dad didn't have the time in between teaching his boys basic hunting practices and running his own life into hell. The "friends" he made through the various schools they attended and even Stanford were all surface valued. No one knew the truth. No one knew him. No one knew he was a mess. That he had secrets. That he was vulnerable. That he was cursed and scared.

No one except Dean. And wasn't it a kick that with everything Dean was willing to give, his life included, that Sam was the one to throw it in his face. He was the one pushing instead of pulling.

Dean's face was drawn into a questioning look as he watched Sam sit in silence, the tears running down his baby brother's cheeks. His hands were clutching the younger man's arms, squeezing, shaking at times, calling his name, but Sam… Sam seemed dazed.

"Sam, come on, you're scaring me." Still no response. The thought of hauling back and slapping him across his face crossed his mind when the hazels behind his brother's lids seem to find their light.

"Dean?"

The older man winced at the soft sound of his own name. He wanted to say something, but he was all out of words. His arms reached around and he roughly tugged his brother to him in a warm hold, his chin resting on the crook of Sam's collar bone and his younger brother tucked into his chest. Dean felt Sam grab at the sides of his t-shirt, fisting the material in his hands, leaving Dean's damaged back free to expand and retract for the both of them.

_She's as sweet as tupelo honey_

_Just, like the honey, baby, from the bee. _

This is why he sold his soul for his brother's life. Because Sam had so much life to give. And Dean needed Sam to give him life back. If it worked out, maybe, just maybe, they both could be saved.

Sam sighed into the soft cotton. He closed his eyes and held on tight, letting Dean's shirt absorb his tears. With the empty cabin sheltering them, it wasn't surprising that he felt right at home in his brother's embrace.

WWW

_Dean was sitting in the brown leather chair. He was drinking from the black coffee mug and whittling at that damn candlestick. Sam sat up, watching him with narrowed eyes and a heavy heart. Why? Why this dream? _

_Dean stood up and walked over to his brother, laying on the couch, hoisted on his elbows, looking up. Sam glanced around. No Carly. No tree. Just him and Dean. _

"_You make a stake, Dean?"_

_Dean nodded. "Yep."_

"_What're you hunting?"_

_The man smiled. It was bizarre. "You."_

"Sam!"

The bumps and springs of the thin mattress from the pull-out sofa were being pressed into Sam's back. He opened his eyes and saw his brother through the light of the moon.

"What?"

Dean didn't let go, but he sat back, giving Sam some room to breathe. "I'm not gonna kill you."

The darkened iris's blinked. "What?"

"You were mumbling. Said I was gonna kill you. I could never… I will never kill you." He tightened his grip on Sam's arms.

"Carly… she was… like me. Yeah?"

Dean cursed under his breath. It was never ending. The pain that followed them, the guilt they took, the secrets they kept. The fear. "No, Sam."

Always Dean. Sam gripped back. "Dean…" he felt like the world was still off, spinning faster on its axis than normal. "I killed a boy."

He could see Dean's head bob up and down in the neon light. "You killed a werewolf. You couldn't help it that he changed that way when he was little. You would have _never_ killed a boy. What you did, Sammy… it doesn't make you a monster. And I…" Dean's voice trailed for a second, "I don't see you that way." When he didn't get a response, he went on, "I killed his mother. It's no different."

His mother. Weird. It was odd to hear the sounds of family associated with the hideous evils in the world. Sam nodded as Dean let go. The older brother walking around the sofa bed, passing by the old oak door. They secretly missed Carly. Missed the door opening and shutting. Missed Eliza's giggle. Missed that another family was gone from the Earth. Even if they weren't natural. They had still been good to the world. Possibly even good for the Winchesters.

"What do you think her number was?" Dean asked, thinking of Carly and the door. "You know, when she would rub the oak?"

Sam shrugged. "She counted so fast. Probably in the hundreds."

Dean's arm fell over his head, clutching the hilt of his knife. The cabin was dark, only the wan light from the moon filtered into the windows. He could barely see Sam against the white pillowcase.

"Sam?" He could feel the turn of his brother's neck, knew he was looking at him through the black. He didn't respond, he just waited. Dean swallowed. "I'm sorry."

No more Tom Petty. The iPod was turned off. No more bare feet slapping on the hardwood. The vampires were dead. No more counting days until he would be alone. Until there was no one left who knew him.

Really knew him.

Sam listened for a sign that things would be okay, that things would be better, but everything was so _quiet_. He didn't hear anything. Just the beat of his brother's heart. And for some strange reason, he noticed his own heart was thumping in perfect synch with it. Maybe there was sign after all.

_Huh. _

Sam's lashes fluttered, causing the salt in his eyes to burn again. He was hoping he had been all cried out. But his body wasn't quite there yet. "Thank-you, Dean."

They were each just words spoken, simple sentences any child could say in a desperate moment. But each man meant it. For more than one reason. And the other brother knew it and accepted it into his heart. Because in the end people just want one other person in this world who knows who they are and still loves them for everything that comes with it.

Even if that person happens to be your brother.

**Playlist:** _Learning to Fly _(sung by Carly George) and _Refugee_ performed by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, _Bloodletting_ (sung by Carly George) by Concrete Blonde and _Tupelo Honey_ performed by Van Morrison.

**A/N: **Thanks for reading – and for those of you who are reviewing, truly, thank-you.

I've been in the fanfiction world now for about six months and I need a beta. This is how I write. I have issues with homonyms and I am not always a winner with keeping with the person point of views when I change to a new person. I didn't know if anyone would be interested in being a beta or have someone to suggest. Most of the people I've talked to already have people they beta for and their plates are full. So, if you're interested, I'd love to hear from you.

Oh, and, K - if you're reading this - you have my email address. Bring it on, I promise I won't be a baby about it.

Thanks again.


End file.
